Roasted Chicken with Orange, Honey, and Cumin

I had a chicken that needed to be roasted and luckily it was a cool day so I could do it without overheating the house. I went in search of a recipe online and I found this Mark Bittman recipe that sounded perfect. I followed his instructions except I added a bit of garlic to the sauce and I also stuffed the bird with a bit of cilantro, onion, and more garlic cloves for extra flavor. This chicken

Chinese Noodles: Recipe

I'm sure Asian cooking guru Jaden of Steamy Kitchen would cringe if she saw this noodle recipe, but I can't help it. It was my go-to dish my last year in college and it's a keeper. My senior year I shared a big beach house with four other girls in Santa Cruz, California. I seemed to be the only one really interested in cooking. One was a Japanese American basketball player who ate bowls and bowls of rice, one was a perpetual dieter, another favored baked or fried foods that always seemed to incorporate Crisco, and one was a pint-sized Chinese American sophomore from Sacramento who came from a very large family. She didn't cook very frequently, but this easy noodle recipe was something I learned from her.

I recently received a number of Annie Chun's noodles. The dried chow mein noodles reminded me of this long forgotten recipe. Perfect for a college student or anyone else for that matter, it's fast, cheap and easy. It can be eaten very simply or dressed up any number of ways with toppings. It's good served hot or cold. I like it with a sprinkling of chopped cilantro and green onions and shreds of chicken. But it's surprisingly satisfying plain too. I have no idea if it is in any way authentic, I only know it makes a comforting meal when you can't think any further than the pantry.

When you make chow mein noodles be sure to rinse them or they can get very sticky. I've used this sauce on flat rice noodles and even on spaghetti in a pinch. While the recipe I learned was equal parts ketchup and oyster sauce, you could add ginger, toasted sesame oil, Chinese chile garlic sauce, Sriracha sauce, whatever you like! It is one of the reasons I always have a bottle of good quality oyster sauce on hand.

Chinese Noodles
serves 4

12 ounces dry chow mein noodles
3 Tablespoons ketchup
3 Tablespoons oyster sauce

Optional garnishes:
Sliced green onions, cilantro, cucumber, roast pork or shredded chicken

Cook noodles according to instructions and rinse briefly. Combine ketchup and oyster sauce in a large bowl, then add noodles and toss to combine. Top with any garnishes you like.

Enjoy!

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Note: This recipe is very similar to one in the New York Times by Mark Bittman called Egg Noodles with Soy Broth. It calls for noodles dressed in equal parts soy sauce, ketchup and a dash of rice wine vinegar.

Pantry Paella: Recipe

My kitchen is overflowing. My freezer is so full I can barely close it. I sometimes hear the crash of bottles, jars and tins falling off my pantry shelves and onto the floor. I seriously think I could cook and eat without going out of the house for a month. Ok, I might get bored of tuna and beans and pasta, but then again, maybe not. I have no idea what causes me to hoard food, but I sometimes imagine I must have been a starving Italian casalinga in another lifetime.

The other day I was thinking about using the short grain Valencia rice I had languishing in the cupboard to make paella. I was going to buy some shrimp but as I perused various recipes it became clear to me that you can make paella with just about any combination of vegetables, seafood or meat. There is no one paella. I figured I might as well use what I have on hand. In my pantry I had a jar of artichokes and a can of green olives, and in the freezer I had pearl onions, peas and a single sausage. Those ingredients were what I used on top of the paella rice. I tweaked the technique I found in a Mark Bittman recipe Tomato Paella to make the rice.

I know it seems hard to believe, but I only used one sausage for 4 servings of paella! Actually, you could easily make this a vegetarian dish. The idea is to use any leftover cooked or prepared vegetables and meats you have on hand or to raid your pantry. I wouldn't make this recipe unless I had several things I wanted to use up. This recipe is a good excuse for not throwing away that 1/4 cup of leftover carrots or peas or whatever you find yourself staring at when cleaning up after dinner. The variations are endless.

Pantry Paella
Serves 4

4 cups liquid, a combination of broth, water and juice from toppings (see below)
1 tablespoon tomato paste
Large pinch saffron threads
2 teaspoons paprika, preferably Spanish pimentón (smoked paprika)
2 1/2 cups toppings--cooked vegetables, seafood, meat (such as peas, artichokes, green olives, red peppers, shrimp, chicken, sausage)
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
2/3 cup onion, minced
1 tablespoon minced garlic, about 2 large cloves
2 cups preferably Spanish or other short-grain rice
Minced parsley for garnish
Lemon wedges

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Combine stock and water with tomato paste, saffron and paprika in a saucepan and heat.
Put oil in a 10- or 12-inch ovenproof skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion and garlic, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and cook, stirring occasionally, until vegetables soften, 3 to 5 minutes. Add rice and cook, stirring occasionally, until it is shiny, another minute or two. Add liquid and stir until just combined.

Put pan in oven and roast, undisturbed, for 15 minutes. Check to see if rice is dry and just tender. If not, return pan to oven and continue cooking for another 5 minutes. If rice is dry but still is not quite done, add a small amount of stock or water or white wine. Amount of liquid will vary depending upon the size of your pan. When rice is ready, turn off oven, sprinkle toppings on rice and cover with lid or foil. Let pan sit in the oven for 5 to 15 minutes. Sprinkle with parsley and serve with lemon.

Enjoy!

Chicken Roasted in a Pot: Recipe

Last month it seemed everyone was roasting a chicken. Perhaps the chill in the air inspired a desire for something comforting and familiar. I couldn't watch a cooking show on television, read a newspaper online or food magazine without staring at yet another roast chicken. And blogs! It seems just about every food blogger was roasting chicken. I think it was the steady stream of breathtaking photos that finally got to me.

This is a "poulet en cocotte" recipe that I modified. I saw it on a certain television program and decided I would make it a little differently. It was moist but didn't yield crispy skin. Fresh out of the oven, I particularly enjoy roast chicken with roasted root vegetables or a big green salad and boiled potatoes all slathered with vinaigrette. The next day I shred the leftover chicken and use it in something else like enchiladas, another excellent comfort food.

The liquid from the chicken was very rich and flavorful and I had so much of it leftover, I used it to make grits. Let me tell you, the next time you have any kind of au jus or gravy, use it as part of the cooking liquid in grits and stir in some cheese after taking the pot off the stove. This makes the most amazingly delicious side dish or breakfast. It's perfect on cold mornings when you want something as warm and filling as hot cereal but prefer savory rather than sweet flavors. Honestly, I would make this chicken again just so I had the juice to make grits!

French Style Chicken Roasted in a Pot

4 1/2 to 5 pound roasting chicken
3 teaspoons kosher salt
1 tablespoon butter
1 small onion, roughly chopped
1 small stalk celery, roughly chopped
1 small carrot, roughly chopped
5 garlic cloves, peeled and chopped

Preheat oven to 250 degrees. Pat chicken dry and season with salt. Melt butter in large Dutch oven over medium heat. Add chicken breast-side down. Cook until breast is darkly browned, about 8 minutes. Using a wooden spoon or tongs inserted into cavity of bird, flip chicken and add the vegetables, continue cooking another 6 minutes. Remove Dutch oven from heat; place large sheet of foil over pot and cover tightly with lid. Transfer pot to oven and cook until thermometer registers 160 degrees when inserted in thickest part of breast and 175 degrees in thickest part of thigh, this will take somewhere around an hour and 20 minutes.

Transfer chicken to carving board, tent with foil, and rest a full 20 minutes. Carve chicken, serve with juices from the pot (and carving of the bird).

Enjoy!

Here are just a sampling of January 2009, roast chicken posts. Try visiting a few and see if you don't find yourself planning a chicken dinner...

Last Night's Dinner Roast Chicken 3 Ways

Sticky Gooey Creamy Chewy blog's Roast Chicken with Pancetta & Olives

For The Love of Cooking Lemon, Garlic & Basil Slow Roasted Chicken

Whisk blog's Poulet en Cocotte Grand Mere

Thursday Night Smackdown Chicken with 50 Cloves of Garlic

Serious Eats Paprika Roast Chicken

Crispy Panko Mustard Chicken: Recipe

Do you know panko? It's a Japanese style of bread crumbs used to coat fried food. The crumbs are large and very flaky. It's made from yeast-raised bread dough that is baked in a special oven so it does not form a crust. The crumbs start out very pale colored but cook up golden brown. You can find it in the Asian section of just about any supermarket.

Traditional Japanese recipes using panko include Tonkatsu, a breaded fried pork cutlet. It is delicious, like most fried food, but not very healthy. I knew there had to be a way to use panko to make an oven-fried crispy chicken breast or cutlet. But I will admit, it took several attempts to get this one right. It really satisfies that craving for crispy fried food but is practically guilt-free. I used the Creole Mustard from Dulcet Cuisine which has a stone-ground texture and is flavored with onion, garlic, paprika, pepper and thyme. So I guess this is kind of a Southern/Japanese fusion entree.

The trick to this technique is to mix the panko crumbs with just a little bit of melted butter then put it on top of the mustard coated chicken by hand instead of dipping the chicken in the crumbs. You can use any kind of mustard you like, but the Creole Mustard is really terrific with this recipe. I recommend letting the chicken cool a little and serving it in slices with roast potatoes, carrots and brussels sprouts.

Crispy Panko Mustard Chicken
serves 2

1 Tablespoon unsalted butter
1 Tablespoon Creole Mustard
1/4 cup panko
2 skinless, boneless chicken breasts

Preheat oven to 475 degrees. Melt the butter in a small dish in a microwave oven then combine the butter with the panko crumbs in a small mixing bowl.

Coat chicken breasts with mustard then place on a greased, foil-lined baking sheet, top with crumbs and bake approximately 15 minutes or until cooked through and golden brown.

Enjoy!

Cool Quesadilla Combos:Recipe

Somewhere along the line I seem to have forgotten about quesadillas. But recently a couple of factors lead to me rediscovering them and their potential. One is the Organic Whole Wheat & Corn Flour Tortillas available at Trader Joe's. Each tortilla has only one gram of fat, five grams of fiber and is high in iron. They fit into my "try to eat more whole grain foods" resolution. A little experimenting lead me to discover that the nutty flavor of whole wheat tortillas is really good with non-traditional, not-necessarily Mexican fillings.

The other bit of inspiration came from a recipe I read in Sara Foster's Casual Cooking for Grilled Shrimp and Goat Cheese Toastadas. That jumping off point lead me to create a shrimp, avocado, radicchio and goat cheese quesadilla with a drizzle of chimichurri sauce. It was truly outstanding. I know quesadillas were all the rage about five years ago, but if you haven't played around with them in a while, they are definitely worth revisiting.

Below is a list of some of my favorite filling ingredients and my tips to get you started.

VEGETABLES spinach olives avocado onions potatoes asparagus lentils beans bitter greens mushrooms red peppers

MEAT/FISH shrimp chicken turkey bacon roast pork sausage caviar ham duck

CHEESES fontina feta cheddar blue goat brie cream-cheese camembert

FRUIT tomatoes fig apple mango pear raisins apricots plums strawberries

FLAVORINGS salsa chutney bbq sauce chimichurri pesto truffle oil garam masala balsamic black pepper

1. Pair up classic combinations, some suggestions:
cheddar and chutney
chicken, mango and bbq sauce
shrimp, feta and green onions
brie and pear

2. Restraint is key. Don't overstuff! For one regular sized flour tortilla, try not to add more than 1/2 cup of fillings.

3. Not every combination has to have cheese, I find leftover Indian food tastes great in a whole wheat tortilla without any cheese at all. Pesto, with or without parmesan cheese is wonderful with potatoes.

4. Use a lightly oiled non-stick pan for cooking your quesadillas and when cooking them open face, use a lid to help melt the cheese and heat up the fillings quickly. When the cheese melts, fold the quesadilla over and remove it from the pan.

5. You can also make them open-faced or tostada style. So technically they are not always "quesadillas" but, who cares?

If you'd care to share, let me know your favorite combo, the more nontraditional the better. The one in the photo? Roast pork, asparagus and Stilton.

FOOD