Meaty Monday: Cashew Chicken with Leeks & Broccoli

There is a popular slow cooker recipe for Cashew Chicken that is floating on the web these days. I tried it. It's OK, a bit bland, and it has been around for years. I DO have a problem with it, though. All the cooking instructions have you cook it in the slow cooker for 3 to 4 hours. Really? Who the hell is going to dirty a big, ole crock to cook something for 3 hours?  For 3 hours, I'll use a covered fry pan and the stove or oven.  Easier to clean a fry pan than a crock. If I'm making something in my slow cooker, it better be able to stay in there all day, while I go do other things. Like work, shop, or play with the kids at the park. All day. Which isn't just 3 hours.

Another thing, why would you WANT to cook chicken parts in a slow cooker that long? Do your want dinner, or mush? Small chicken cuts cook so fast, I can't imagine why you wouldn't do something like this wonderful Cashew Chicken we have often at our house.

This cashew chicken dish takes about 30 minutes to make and easy to fix, even after a miserable Monday full of ringing phones, whining co-workers and traffic delays. It's juicy, saucy,. toothsome and comforting at the end of a loooong day. There's also no clunky crock to clean.

Note: You may be able to make this from what's hanging around on your fridge door --I've got hoisin, ketchup, and minced ginger there all the time. Even easier, substitute an onion for the leek, and get the ready-to-heat cooked rice for a good, fast weeknight meal. This dish is gluten free if your Asian condiments are all gluten free.

Cashew Chicken with Leeks & Broccoli
all pretty on my favorite platter from Sophie Conran.

Cashew Chicken with Leeks & Broccoli

Serves 4

Ingredients:

4 boneless chicken breasts halves, about 4-5 ounces each, in 1" chunks
2 Tablespoons cornstarch
2 Tablespoons organic canola or peanut oil

1 large carrot, cut in ribbons with a vegetable peeler

1 large leek, white part only, in wafer thin slices

1 broccoli crown, broken in florets

3 garlic cloves, minced or 1 tsp. jarred garlic
1 Tablespoon minced fresh ginger, or jarred crushed ginger
2 Tablespoons rice vinegar
2  Tablespoons  organic ketchup

1 Tablespoon wheat free tamari soy
1 Tablespoon honey
1/4 tsp. cayenne pepper or a few dashes of hot sauce
1/2 cup chicken stock or water

1 cup roasted cashew halves
thin sliced scallion for garnish, optional but nice

Cooked rice

Instructions:

1. In a zip top bag, shake the chicken and the cornstarch together until the chicken is coated.  In a small bowl, mix the garlic, the ginger, the vinegar, ketchup, tamari, honey and the  hot pepper sauce if using. Heat the oil in a large nonstick pan on medium-high heat, and brown the chicken on at least two sides, about 2-3 minutes a side. Add the leeks and carrots, stir, and reduce the heat to low, stirring occasionally.

2. Cook the broccoli, by steaming or microwaving, set aside. Add the ketchup mixture to the chicken, along with the stock or water, bring to a simmer, and cover. Cook for 5 -7 minutes until the chicken is cooked through. Stir in the cashews, and serve with rice, garnished with a ring of broccoli and a sprinkling of scallion.

Meaty Monday: Grilled Chicken Paillards with Corn, Green Beans & Basil Drizzle

Certain foods, I think, are etched into our national psyche as symbols of things near and dear to our heart. If you are eating cotton candy, chances are there's a Ferris wheel not far away,  and if you're munching a corn dog on a stick, there is probably a heifer wearing a blue ribbon in her halter within spitting distance. Corn, tomatoes, basil and green beans scream "Summer!" to me in a not so subtle way. If there is ever a time of year when these foods have reached their pinnacle of perfection, it is now.

Chuck likes grilled chicken. Actually he loves grilled chicken. Really loves grilled chicken. Really thin grilled chicken. If I was willing to serve it at least once a week on a regular day (have I told you about our Tuesday burger night....?), he'd be thrilled. Me, I like change. Especially different dinners.

Since I do like to make dinners that will make us both happy, I came up with this combo that even I could eat once a week...at least during the Summer. The chicken is a simple as can be, "paillards" is just a way to describe very thin pounded slices of meat -- and the drizzle is somewhere between a pesto and a vinaigrette. This can become one of your favorite do-ahead meals. Add the two, to the corn, fresh beans and tomato, and the whole thing just sings. If you need a vegan or vegetarian (or if you are doing a Meatless Monday side dish), just replace the butter in the corn dish with evoo.

Yes, it's every bit as good as it looks. Yes, I did lick the plate.

Grilled Chicken Paillards with Corn, Green Beans & Basil Drizzle
Serves 4

For the chicken:

1/4 cup low sodium gluten free tamari soy sauce
1/4 cup dry red wine
2 garlic cloves, crushed (jarred equivalent is fine)
2T olive oil
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, pounded thin (paillards)

For the drizzle:

1/2 cup fresh basil leaves, tightly packed
3 garlic cloves, (jarred equivalent is fine)
1/2 cup evoo
3 tablespoons lemon juice
1 teaspoon kosher salt

For the vegetables:

1 tablespoon butter or organic corn oil
4 ears of fresh corn, shucked and kernels cut off the cob
1/2 lb. fresh green beans, trimmed and broken in half
1 small fresh tomato, diced
a few basil sprigs for garnish


Instructions:

1. Early in the day, mix the first 4 ingredients and pour into a zip top bag. Add the chicken and chill until dinner.

2. Place all the ingredients for the drizzle in a blender or a mini processor and puree. Place in a covered container in the fridge until dinner time.

3. At mealtime, heat the butter or oil in a medium saucepan, over medium heat, and add the corn and the green beans to the butter. Stir to coat and sauté for a few minutes. Add 1/3 cup of water to the pan, cover and let steam for about 3-4 minutes until the beans are tender. Remove the lid and cook away all the water. Turn off the heat and stir in 3 Tablespoons of the drizzle. Cover and set aside.

4. Heat your grill to medium high, remove the chicken from the marinade (discard the marinade) and grill the chicken about 3-4 minutes per side depending on how thick it is. Place on a platter and drizzle lightly with a bit of the basil drizzle to serve. Pass the extra basil drizzle on the side.

5. Turn the vegetables into a bowl. Sprinkle the tomato over the top and garnish with a basil sprig.

Delicious corn, green beans with basil drizzle and chopped tomatoes,
easily made vegan...

Chimichurri Rojo (Red) with Chicken

Chimichurri seems to be quite the darling of the food magazines and blogging set this season. As a marinade or a sauce, it's a wonderful thing. The most common one is green, made with lots of parsley or cilantro. It's really such a versatile sauce, easy to make, and will last a long time in the fridge. There are as many versions of this sauce as there are food writers and chefs, and just about all are good. But no one hardly ever talks about the red sauce.

Well, you know me. I'm a bit off the norm. I like the green version, but I LOVE the red  sauce more --Chimichurri Rojo.  Spicy and a little sweet and herby, the sauce also keeps well in the fridge and is one of my favorite marinades for plain old boneless, skinless chicken breasts. After a good soak in the sauce, and grilling, you'll have the tenderest, tastiest chicken around. Keep it around to splash on whatever you feel like eating in this heat ---shrimp, steak, or even grilled vegetables.

Chicken Marinated in Chimichurri Rojo (red) 

Chimichurri Rojo (Red) with Chicken

Mildly spiced, up the cayenne for a more authentic  flavor

 2 lb. Boneless, skinless chicken breast, flattened to 1/2" thick

1/3 cup sherry or red wine vinegar vinegar

1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

2 Tablespoons tomato paste

1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1 teaspoon smoked paprika (pimenton)

1/2 tsp ground cumin

3 garlic cloves, minced

2 scallions, trimmed in 1" pieces

2T sugar or equivalent Stevia

1/2 teaspoon sea salt

1/2 cup finely chopped  Italian flat leaf parsley or cilantro

Puree all ingredients up to parsley in a blender or mini processor until smooth.  Add the parsley or cilantro and just pulse the machine, leaving the herbs fairly chunky.

Pour half of the chimichurri sauce over the chicken, in either a zip top bag, or covered container, and chill for at least 1 hour and up to 12 hours. Refrigerate the rest of the sauce in a separate container.

Preheat your grill or frying pan to medium high, and grill or pan grill the chicken for 5 to 7 minutes per side to desired doneness. You can also bake the breasts right in the marinade. Serve the additional reserved chimichurri on the side as desired.

A Silver Palate Cookbook Riff...Chicken Blanketed with Mushrooms & Speck

Sometimes a little disorganization pays off. A few weeks ago while looking for an entirely different cookbook on my shelves, I came upon my old, early 1980's copy of The Silver Palate Cookbook. I love this book, and being easily distracted, I sat on the floor in the hall and started thumbing through it, remembering old favorites, and the dinner parties I threw with this book propped on the counter as I cooked. Some books I consider seminal cookbooks for me; The Silver Palate was one, right next to it on the shelf lives the Frog / Commisary Cookbook another one.

Being young, newly married, and having bought our first home (mortgage rates were at 12% back then), we ate a lot of chicken, a lot. It was cheap, and you could dress it up, and I did. One of my absolute favorites was "Chicken Baked on a Bed of Wild Mushrooms". Wild mushrooms seemed so sophisticated back then, and I could squeeze the food budget enough to get them at the Mushroom Palace, over in Devon on a fairly regular basis. Just to make that recipe.

It was tempting to just make that old recipe as written, just one more time and I had the basic ingredients on hand, but I had other things, too, that I wanted to use for dinner that night. So my chicken, isn't on a bed, it's under a blanket. A creamy blanket of mushrooms and smokey pork (Italian speck) for good measure.

Chicken Blanketed with Mushrooms & Speck

Chicken Blanketed with Mushrooms & Speck

Inspired by "Chicken on a Bed of Wild Mushrooms" from The Silver Palate Cookbook.

Serves 4-6

1 oz. dried wild mushroom (porcini or morels)
1-1/2 cups boiling chicken stock
3T olive oil, divided
1-1/2 lb boneless, skinless chicken breasts, halved through the middle and pounded flat
4 oz. of speck or lean smoked bacon, in 1/4" dice
8 oz. sliced cremini mushrooms
1/2 cup finely chopped shallot
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 cup creme fraiche
1/2 cup sweet vermouth
2 tsp. dried marjoram
salt and pepper


1. Place the dried mushrooms in a heatproof bowl, and pour the boiling stock over them. Press down on them if needed to submerge. Let stand 10 minutes.  Spray a 4-quart shallow baking dish with cooking spray. Heat 2 T of the oil in a large, non-stick skillet over medium-high heat, and brown the chicken on each side for about 2 minutes. Remove the browned chicken to the sprayed baking dish, arranging evenly over the bottom of the dish. Turn off the heat under the skillet. Preheat the oven to 350ºF.

2.  Remove the dried mushrooms from the stock,  set the stock aside, and chop into bite-sized pieces if necessary. Turn the heat under the skillet to medium-high, and add the last tablespoon of oil. Add the speck to the pan, along with the fresh mushrooms, the rehydrated dried mushrooms, the shallots and the garlic.  Cook until the fresh mushrooms give up their liquid. 

3. Add the creme fraiche, the vermouth, and 1 cup of the reserved stock. Add the marjoram, and season with the salt and pepper to taste. Cook uncovered until there is only about 1 cup of liquid left in the skillet. 

4. Carefully spoon the speck and mushroom mixture over the chicken, and pour over any remaining juices. Cover the baking dish with either a lid or foil, and place in the oven. Bake about 40 minutes. 

Chicken with Fennel, Peppers & Orange

Chicken with Fennel, Peppers & Orange. A happy accident.

A couple of weeks ago, I discovered my fridge and freezer were absolutely overloaded. Think I told you all about it. Sometimes I just put food in the freezer as if dropping it into The Frozen Pit of No Return. Some things are planned to end up in there, like finding chops on sale, or shrimp on sale. Other things end up in there because our plans change, and dinner will not get cooked that night, so into the freezer go the ingredients. Those are the ones that get forgotten. Frostbitten sometimes, if I don't wrap well, thinking I'll use them in a couple of days. But I forget. So I have sadly had to toss out some lovely things that were destroyed by my freezer and my own laziness. Like lobster tail. Yep. I confess.

These chicken breasts were on sale at my local market about a month ago, and were calling my name from the depths of The Frozen Pit of No Return. So I looked into the fridge to see what else was lurking in there to use, too. I had a couple of fennel bulbs, some red bell peppers, some homegrown garlic, and some home - frozen leeks. And a bag of oranges.  Some leftover chablis. Bingo, my Southern Italian genes kicked into gear: Fennel and Oranges. Okay Sicilian...Dinner, nonetheless.

Let me just say, it was scrumptious. It'll still be scrumptious even if you actually go out and buy the ingredients fresh.

Note: We had this with polenta, but another gluten free choice would be rice. If you'd like this to be grain free, a white bean puree (cannellini beans pureed with garlic and olive oil) would be absolutely fabulous. And a salad...

Chicken with Fennel, Red Peppers & Orange
Serves 4

Ingredients:
4 large boneless, skinless chicken breasts (approx. 2 lb.)
1T extra virgin olive oil
sea or kosher salt and fresh-ground black pepper
2 red bell peppers, seeded and sliced
2 small fennel bulbs, sliced
1 cup sliced leeks
3 garlic cloves, minced
zest from 1 large orange
juice from 1 large orange
1T Italian Seasoning
1 cup dry white wine or dry Vermouth
1 cup low sodium or unsalted chicken broth

Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Lightly oil or spray a 2-3 quart baking dish. Salt and pepper the chicken breasts on both sides, and heat the oil in a 12" skillet over medium-high heat. When it ripples or even smokes slightly, add the chicken breasts, and cook without moving them for about 4 minutes, until lightly browned. Turn the chicken and do the same to the second side.

Remove the chicken to a plate and add the peppers, fennel, leeks and garlic to the skillet. Sauté until the fennel and peppers are beginning to soften. Remove the vegetables to the baking dish, and nestle the chicken into the vegetables. To the skillet, add the orange juice, stock, wine, orange zest and Italian Serasoning. Grind in some black pepper, and add a big pinch of salt. Bring to a boil, scraping up any bits, and cook the liquid until reduced by about 1/3. Pour the liquid over the chicken in the baking dish.

Cover the dish tightly with foil or a lid, and place in the oven. Bake for about 1 hour to 1-1/4 hour.

Serve with polenta, rice or a white bean puree.