Fennel-Braised Chicken Legs

I love Autumn weather as it inspires weekend after weekend of slow-cooked, satisfying foods in my kitchen. I have been braising things left and right, but as there has been a lot of red meat lately, I tried to lighten it up with some chicken this time around.

Sadly, I didn't find this (Michael Symon recipe) to be the most enjoyable dish as the fennel flavor was a little too pronounced for my taste, but if you are a fan, try this out.

Start by browning your seasoned chicken legs in a large heavy-bottom pan with a bit of olive oil. When crisp and easy to lift, remove and set aside.

The other goodies: one whole fennel bulb, one medium onion, four cloves of garlic, fresh thyme, potatoes, bay leaf, red pepper flakes, and one orange.

Chop the fennel, onion, and potatoes into large wedges.

Add the fennel and some of the onion to the pan drippings and allow to brown.

Add the potatoes, garlic, any remaining onion, red pepper flakes, and thyme. Season with salt.

Deglaze the pan with 1 cup of white wine, scraping up the tasty brown bits with a wooden spoon.

Then add the chicken back into the pan on top of the veggies and add chicken stock until almost halfway up the sides of the legs.

Add the bay leaf and a few more sprigs of thyme, place the lid on top and place into a 350º oven for 35-45 minutes until the chicken is cooked through.

Remove the chicken to plate and add the zest and juice of the orange to the pot for a bit of brightness.

 Reduce the drippings until thickened as desired and pour over the chicken and vegetables.

Tho the chicken was tender, I found the flavors in this a bit thin in general. To combat this next time, while reducing the liquids I would add a bit of chicken glacé to make a richer sauce, and definitely use stock instead of the suggested water for the braise. I love braising chicken in cider, whether apple or pear, as it adds a sweetness to the meat once cooked. Water does nothing to help flavor chicken.

While I really like Michael Symon (his giggle kills me!) and I want to like fennel, this did not succeed in winning me over.

If you try this and come up with something delicious, pass along your tips!

Mojito Chicken

Step aside Cilantro-Lime Chicken.

Make way for the boozy chicken!

(Not to be confused with this boozy but brilliant Best Roast Chicken.)

In a large bowl combine:

1/2 cup light rum

1/2 cup mint

1/2 cup lime juice

1/2 cup chopped onion

2 cloves of garlic, minced

1 TBSP lime zest

1/4 cup agave nectar

1 jalapeño, seeded

1 tsp cayenne pepper

1 TBSP cumin

1/2 tsp cinnamon

Blend all of the ingredients in a food processor, pour back into the bowl and add chicken, breasts or thighs as you prefer, and allow to marinate in the refrigerator 2-4 hrs.

When ready to cook, remove the chicken and discard the marinade.

Season both sides with salt before cooking, and throw on either a hot pan or a hot grill, tho a grill is preferred. 

(You know you're eking out those last few warm nights before putting the grill away for the winter!)

Then: 

don't forget to take pictures of the finished product 

or you will have no final "wow that looks tasty" moment for your blog post.

Whoops.

Still, this was pretty tasty and made a lovely change for  a light dinner. Try serving it with some quinoa with fresh mint and cilantro mixed in, and maybe some queso fresco.

Dinner. Done.

Quick Chicken Soft Tacos

I've been doing a lot of variations on salsa this summer. In the winter I sometimes find salsa to be too light and unsatisfying, but in the hotter months I find I'm using it left and right, on eggs, on top of fish, and this time, to fill a soft taco.

For this dish I used a little leftover basmati rice for The Hubs, as he likes more of a burrito than a soft taco, but I made mine using just the chicken and Corn & Black Bean Salsa.

First I took two chicken breasts and cut them into bite-sized pieces. I sprinkled them with salt, ground cumin, and chili powder and rolled them around until evenly coated. (About 1/2 tsp each.)

Then in a non-stick pan on medium-high heat and with a bit of olive oil, I cooked the chicken until opaque, about 5-7 minutes.

This salsa is really the clincher of the dish, as it has the most flavor.

A little sautéed shallot, corn, 1 pat of butter, black beans (from soup), and a heap of fresh cilantro.

Sweet, savory, and bright all at once.

This would also taste fabulous with some of my Avocado Purée slathered on the tortilla before filling it (which is how I ate the leftovers for lunch the next day!) but all told this dinner took under 20 minutes start to finish. 

And The Hubs had seconds, so you know it was pretty good.

Cilantro & Lime Chicken

It's a fiesta in your mouth!

Or, you know. Dinner.

My thanks to Google and MyRecipes.com for helping me find this dish.

To start with, create the marinade.

1/4 cup lime juice, 1/2 cup chopped cilantro, 6 cloves of garlic (yowza!), 1 TBSP honey, 1 TBSP evoo, 1/2 tsp salt, 1/4 tsp pepper.

And as I had a leftover jalapeño, I threw that in for good measure as well.

Place your chicken (I had 5 boneless chicken thighs, the recipe suggests 4 chicken breasts) in the marinade and allow to soak for about an hour.

This recipe said anywhere from 30 minutes to overnight, but I find anything that sits in citrus too long starts to cook like a ceviche and break down, so I just went with an hour or so.

Prep your pan with a bit of olive oil on medium-high heat and drop in your chicken.

(Tho if you have access to a grill, that will give this dish a much richer flavor.)

Make sure you discard the marinade as you do not want to eat anything that has had raw chicken soaking in it.

This is a nice change-up from the usual things I make, with a decent tang and a bit of zip from the jalapeño I added.

Give it a whirl!

Black Bean & Corn Salsa

I think I selectively forget how delicious black beans and corn can be, as corn is technically a carb and not the healthy vegetable we all wish it to be.

The side dish is really the star of this meal, so forgive me if I glaze over the chicken a bit.

Well, I guess I should tell you something.

I took three (rather small) chicken breasts and seasoned them with a bit of ground cumin, chili powder, salt, and a very small dusting of ground cinnamon. 

Sauté in olive oil until opaque in the middle and remove. Optional spritz of fresh lime juice once off the heat.

Toss in some diced shallot and garlic, deglaze the pan with some chicken stock, increase the heat to reduce and form a quick pan gravy.

Some of the seasoning from the chicken should be left in the pan to flavor the gravy, so just a little salt should round it out.

Spoon a little over each breast and the chicken is done.

Now for the good stuff.

Now I know a proper cook would use dried beans and soak them and then cook them and season them accordingly, but frankly, there's a reason there's a market for canned beans.

We're in a rush!

Also, it's summer in New York and we've had almost a solid week above 90º and no one wants to be cooking anything for more than five minutes.

As it is summer while I am typing this, you can find lovely fresh corn everywhere.

However, should you be making this in the dead of winter and the bag of frozen corn you found on the door has serious freezer burn, fear not. There's a way to resuscitate your desiccated corn.

Simply place it in a hot pan with a pat of melted butter and a splash or two of water, season with a pinch of salt, and bring the whole mess up to a simmer. Allow the corn to cook in the buttery liquid until it has largely been absorbed, 2-3 minutes, and you should have sweet and plump kernels once more.

For THIS dish tho, I used half a medium shallot, diced and lightly cooked in a bit of olive oil.

Next I threw in the corn and a pat of butter.

My SUPER cheat for this recipe, and I feel no shame in it, is that I use Goya black bean soup instead of regular black beans. I just strain (and reserve) the soup liquids and throw the already cooked and seasoned black beans into my dish, and I'm DONE!

Well, a few tablespoons of chopped fresh cilantro, taste for salt, and then I'm done.

And it is delicious!

Sweet and savory and bright and perfectly balanced.

This by itself would make a great picnic side, or even a vegetarian lunch by itself, as it works just fine at room temperature.

The Hubs greatly approved of this meal as corn is one of his favorite foods, but I don't serve it that often as it is largely devoid of nutrition, so he gobbled this down in no time.

If you want to be a bit healthier, go 2-1 beans to corn for more protein and fiber. I went about 1-1 because that's just how much I had on hand.

Also, the leftovers when it hits 96º tomorrow will be delicious and completely effortless!

Ginger Chicken Skewers, for 130.

This would be one of the items I made for a friend's wedding recently, but if you're having a few people over for a cocktail party, these would be fairly simple hors d'oeuvre or part of a buffet meal that should be a pretty tasty hit.

This also harkens to my earlier comment about how 40 lbs of chicken breasts can be broken down into roughly 340 satay-style skewers.

Don't forget to soak your skewers in water for about 20 minutes before cooking or they may scorch.

And yes, it takes rather a few hours to break down 40 pounds of bulk chicken breasts, but to give you an idea, each chicken breast should make about 4-5 skewers.

Marinated chicken cubes, ready for skewering

I used the same recipe that I did in my Tangy Asian Chicken/Pork dinner, only multiplied to fit in two giant stock pots to marinate overnight.

That's a lot of soy sauce, honey, garlic, and fresh ginger.

(Thank you, Corrie, for all the grating help!)

Even in larger quantities, I stick with the measurement of equal parts honey and soy sauce, and equal parts garlic and ginger, respectively.

Ready to cook!

If you are making this for just a few people (say, 20-30) I would suggest broiling the skewers for 5-6 minutes total so the chicken remains juicy and tender.

As I was making hundreds, I baked them in a 350º oven for about 18 minutes, knowing they were going to be reheated later and would probably dry out a bit by the second heating.

I just hoped the flavors from the marinade would make up for the slightly dry texture.

Round 1 of about 4

If making this for a smaller group of people, I would suggest reducing the marinade down to a thick dipping sauce for the skewers, but only if you rinsed your chicken well before marinating. If there was any protein "goo" on the chicken your marinade will look like curds and whey. Gross.

An easier option is just to make a second batch of the marinade and reduce the sauce with no worries of contamination or questionable consistency.

Any leftovers you have would be tastily repurposed in a meal like this Quinoa Satay I posted a little while back, but this time you would use chicken stock instead of beef stock.

Either way, it's some tasty chicken!

Leftovers: Roast Chicken & Pesto

I may well have posted this before, but I don't think it was because I had leftover chicken.

I think it was just a Summer-y pasta dish.

This time, I had the never-ending roast chicken leftovers, and a little mozzarella cheese, so I went back to this warm weather staple pasta dish.

While your pasta is cooking in its salted boiling water, combine in a large bowl all your shredded chicken, remaining mozzarella (I had about 1/4 of a bundle left) and roughly 1/3 of a cup of (preferably homemade) pesto.

I went with traditional Genovese basil & pine nut pesto, but I'm sure this would be lovely with whatever your favorite version is, even if that includes walnuts and mint.

Unless you were serving it to me.

In which case you should know better.

(I really hate walnuts.)

My pesto was rather tight, so I drizzled the mixture with some good olive oil before mixing it all together.

Note: this dish would also work with ricotta cheese, so if you have the last quarter of your container in your fridge with no clue what to do with so little, feel free to substitute it here.

Add hot pasta.

Toss to coat and combine.

Use a splash of pasta water if you want a little more of a "sauce" feel.

Grate a little pecorino over the top, and call it dinner delicious.

Revamped Experiment

So, really, no takers on the Aztec Soup?
Damn.
It's quite tasty.

Stolen from my own post, mentioned below

Another very tasty dinner I made tonight is essentially this fabulous meal of roasted acorn squash, which is then mixed into quick-cooking polenta (along with elements that make polenta tasty such as half & half, butter, salt, and ground dried sage), which acts as a base for leftover roast chicken which I toss into some marsala and porcini mushroom gravy, and on top of it all, a dollop of mascarpone cheese and a scattering of pistachios.

It is KILLER people.
And it's going to become a slightly more common dish in this house, what with the almost weekly roasting of chickens that happens around here. Forget side dish. This is now a meal that is good-to-go.
It ain't low-cal, but it is absolutely delicious.

Get on it.
(And enjoy your weekend!)

The Best Roast Chicken Ever

According to the hubs, this is The Greatest Roast Chicken Ever.

And to me, it's The Easiest Roast Chicken Ever.
But possibly also one of the tastiest possible.

WIN! WIN!

And just whhhyyyyyy is it so delicious AND simple?

BACON!

Also, it only requires 6 ingredients:

1 whole roaster chicken (between 3 and 6 lbs.)

3-6 slices of bacon (depending on size of chicken, or preference)

1/3 cup of brandy

1 onion, quartered

salt

water or chicken stock

THAT'S IT!!!!!

There is no brining, no complex stuffing, no chopping except for 2 whacks at an onion, no picking the tiny leaves off of fresh herbs, nada.  The hardest part of this meal is just remembering to baste!

And frankly, in my house, the only things I'd have to go out and purchase for this meal would be the chicken and the bacon, as the other ingredients are always on hand in my kitchen.

It's such a magical food.

 This recipe was inspired by an episode of one of Nigella Lawson's cooking shows, but I could not find the recipe online later, so I just winged it, added a bit more bacon than she mentioned, and threw in the salt for the cavity and the onion out of habit.

Step One: Preheat your oven. (I do 425º for the first 30 minutes, and then the rest of the time cook the chicken at 350º but stick with whatever method you're used to.)

Step Two: Brown your bacon and set aside to drain on paper towels. Possibly make extra as you KNOW you're going to want to snack on some once you smell it cooking.

 Step Three: Pour your (pre-measured) brandy into the pan of bacon drippings and allow it to sizzle (step back!) and combine until it calms down. Set this aside off of the heat.

See the flecks of bacon from the drippings?!

For the bird, I salt the cavity and then place half to a whole onion (quartered) into the cavity for flavor and moisture. (Depends on the size of both the bird and the onion.)

Step Four: Insert bacon into the chicken's cavity and truss your bird. Refrain from placing broken bits of bacon under the chicken's skin, as they will burn a bit. (Things you learn the hard way.)

Step Five: Pour brandied bacon fat over the chicken.

Step Six: Add about 3/4 of an inch of water or chicken stock to the bottom of the pan for basting and to prevent spitting or burning.

 Step Seven: Cook.
(Yes I chose to throw some carrots and onion into the bottom of the pan as well because then you get roasted carrots THAT TASTE LIKE BACON!)
This happened to be a 6 pound bird, so it took 1 hour and 30 minutes to cook, and I basted every 15-20 minutes... or when I remembered.

Crappy photo taken because I just wanted to EAT!

Let the chicken rest on a baking sheet (or carving board, wherever works for you) and turn those amazing drippings into a sweet dark gravy. All I used was a tsp of flour to help it thicken and a little time over a burner with a whisk.

THE GREATEST ROAST CHICKEN.

You're welcome.

Lemon Caper Chicken: Picatta Without the Pounding

Because really, who wouldn't prefer a juicy chicken breast over a pounded-flat cutlet?

I have never really understood the point of pounding a perfectly good cut of meat into a flattened piece of jerky. Sure, it will cook in 2-3 minutes per side, but it's a FLAT PIECE OF MEAT! You have literally beaten the plumpness and juiciness out of it. Really, no thank you.

Keep your schnitzel to yourself.

So for this I pat two boneless skinless chicken breasts dry (always important) and then seasoned them with salt, ground savory, and a little sweet paprika. I then dusted them with flour. (Really, it's much tastier to season them before the flour, rather than seasoning your flour. You need SO MUCH MORE seasoning if you're mixing it with the flour...) Cook in olive oil until opaque all the way through. 

These were rather small chicken breasts, so they only took about 6 minutes on the first side and 4 1/2 on the second.

Once you have removed the chicken breasts to rest it is time for the sauce.

Add another glug or two of olive oil to your pan and add 1 diced shallot. Cook until translucent.

Then add 1-2 cloves of garlic, minced/grated, maybe a teaspoon of flour, and cook an additional 30 seconds to bring it all together.

Next add 1/4 cup white wine, 2 tablespoons of fresh lemon juice, and roughly 1/4 cup of chicken stock.

Add salt to season, about a teaspoon of fresh chopped thyme, and roughly 2 TBSP of drained capers.

Bring this mixture to a simmer and reduce down to a thick, velvety sauce. (Optional finishing touch of a pat of butter to make the sauce extra indulgent.)

It should be a bit salty from the capers, a bit bright from the lemon, and a bit rich from the wine and stock.

I served mine with some pan-roasted carrots (just searched my site for the recipe and did not find it... apparently I need to work on that!) and a leek and white bean purée.

It was delicious.

Also, it was fairly quick cooking, which is a good thing to consider when the weather has been as close, muggy, humid, and downright pouring-rain wet as it has been in NYC the last few days.

And guess what?

There's ANOTHER tornado watch in effect for this evening!

WTF weather patterns?

The East Coast gets hurricanes.

The middle of the country gets tornados.

The West Coast gets earthquakes, brush fires, and mudslides.

Quit messing with the system!

Fingers crossed my next post does not come to you from Kansas.

Spanican Chicken

First full day of Fall in NYC and the weather is still hitting 80º for the high. Tomorrow* it's supposed to be 85º!!! Apparently, what with the killer heat all Summer and tornado last week, Mother Nature is still miffed at us. And again, I don't really blame her, but it remains confusing. 

*Hey, Sassy. I know I'm seeing you tonight, but now you know what the weather will be like tomorrow, so ditch the sweater dresses until you're back from Italy! (Ya lucky stinker...)

After our delicious Mexican meal at El Vez the hubs and I were craving those fabulous flavors again. So, I tried to make a rub for our chicken that would in some way satisfy our taste buds with what I already had in my spice cabinet.

Remember: the hubs will not eat avocado, sour cream, cold tomato salsa, etc., so I couldn't make this all that authentic of a meal. However, the finished product would have gone brilliantly with some guacamole.

I have no idea if I was making something that was more Mexican or more Spanish in style, so, this is Spanican Chicken!

Please, no one be offended by my attempts outside my comfort zone of cooking.

I mixed the following herbs and spices together in various pinches:

chili powder, cumin, dried oregano, coriander, smoked spanish paprika, and ground cloves.

Once I was happy with that mixture I added one large grated clove of garlic, and just enough olive oil to make it into a paste with which to paint the chicken.

Is that a beautiful color or what?

Let the chicken marinate for a couple hours so the flavors can really infuse the chicken.

Also, I did not salt the chicken until right before cooking.

While I was cooking the chicken I decided that a side of black beans would go brilliantly with the dish, so once the chicken was done, I added half a can of drained black bean soup. (Yes, Goya's black bean soup. Not just canned black beans. I sifted the beans out. I did not dump the soup liquid. That is some tasty stuff! Also, it is what I had when I looked in my pantry... it's a TOTAL cheat, but a really delicious one.) I heated the black beans through in the flavorful oil left after cooking the chicken, and added about a tablespoon of dry sherry to the pan for an extra kick. 

Note: If using canned black beans (and thereby also cooking with onion, garlic, seasonings, etc) I would definitely do this again. However, if using black bean soup, I'd skip it as it is already quite flavorful.

Top with minced raw onion or shallot when serving.

A side of roasted potatoes, and dinner was well rounded and very tasty.

No where NEAR as tasty as the meal at El Vez, but it was a valiant effort, if I do say so myself.

And, obviously, I do.

A Twist on Chicken Parm

It's finally cool enough to cook again! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!!

And to take really hot showers again!!! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!!!!!

(I really have missed both of those things for the past 4 months or so...)

The hubs, who is once more training for the NYC Marathon, is allowing me to ride my new bicycle (first new bike since I was about 12 or so!!!) along side him while he runs, and this morning we did a 6.5 mile circuit, turning around within about 15 blocks of the George Washington Bridge. I felt quite virtuous for not only getting outside, but exercising to boot. (Usually me = sloth)

So, I am rewarding myself with curling up with a book while enjoying a fresh batch of asparagus soup. Bring on the fuzzy socks!

Tho I guess before the fuzzy socks, I should actually write about food... OK.

I have definitely shown you this version of cooking grape tomatoes before. Just to show how many ways you can use them, I decided to make chicken parm out of an extra package of tomatoes I bought.

In a pot with a good drizzle of olive oil, on medium high heat, add your tomatoes and place the lid on top. Cook until you hear the tomatoes bursting.

Once they have burst, I season with salt and add one to two cloves of garlic (depending on size and your taste), grated on a microplane. (Lower the heat to medium.) After the garlic has cooked a bit, I add a splash of white wine and then use a potato masher to crush the remaining bits of tomato.

I cook the sauce down another few minutes to make sure all the flavors combine and that the wine cooks out a bit.

While all of that is happening, I cooked up some chicken breasts in olive oil with minced shallot and seasoned with salt. For basics on how to cook chicken, read my Cooking Basics post, specifically scan down to the part on Meat.

When the chicken is about 2 minutes from completely cooked through, I placed slices of fresh mozzarella over the chicken, added a lid to the pan, and melted it down.

You could employ a broiler here instead, but I thought the lid would be faster.

I transfered the mozzarella-covered chicken breasts to plates, and shaved some fresh parmigiano reggiano over the top. Next I ladled some of the tomato sauce over the top.

Grate a little more parmigiano reggiano over that, and sprinkle with fresh basil.

A tasty & healthy spin on a classic.