Chicken Stuffed with Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto and Goat Cheese

I came up with this recipe while I was running errands last week. I had been thinking about a recipe we used to make that called for cutting pockets in boneless chicken breasts and filling them with a mixture of sautéed onions, rehydrated sun-dried tomatoes and goat cheese.

The chicken always sounded so much better than it turned out. I never let the onions cool long enough, resulting in a melting goo of goat cheese and sticky tomatoes that I wrestled to fit into the too-small chicken pockets. And I never diced the tomatoes small enough, so the chicken was full of chewy, assertive sun-dried tomato chunks. Despite the issues, we liked the flavors and I wanted to duplicate them in a format that appealed to us more.

I started with making a sun-dried tomato pesto instead of using chopped sun-dried tomatoes. That worked beautifully. I decided to use caramelized shallots instead of sautéed onions, for a mellower flavor. The goat cheese I kept the same, though I reduced the amount, to keep its sharpness from taking over the dish. I flattened and pounded the chicken, then spread on the filling ingredients before rolling it up. This worked much better than cutting pockets. The end result was everything I had envisioned – tender chicken wrapped around thin layers of tomato pesto, sprinkled here and there with pockets of sharp goat cheese and sweet shallots.

If you follow along regularly you read Monday’s post on caramelized shallots and Wednesday’s post about sun-dried tomato pesto. And if you are a loyal and obedient follower, you made each of these recipes the day I posted them. Now you are ready to make today’s chicken recipe.

Seriously, though, I made both the caramelized shallots and the sun-dried tomato pesto right before I made the chicken. Would I recommend this? Probably not, but it is certainly doable. Just be sure to factor in the time required when you are deciding what time to start. We didn’t eat dinner that night until 7:30, despite my best intentions. Nothing about the recipes is difficult, but you can’t exactly hurry the shallot caramelization process, unless you want to turn it into the shallot burning process.

To simplify things, you can make the shallots and pesto earlier in the day, or a few days ahead of time. The recipe will be a piece of cake if you already have the shallots and sun-dried tomato pesto waiting for you in the fridge.

Download or print the recipe here.

Chicken Stuffed with Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto and Goat Cheese
From The Cook’s Life
Serves 4

3-4 boneless chicken breasts
3-4 tablespoons sun-dried tomato pesto (homemade or purchased)
2 caramelized shallots (about ¼ cup cooked shallots), or more to taste
OR
¼ cup minced onion or shallot, sautéed until soft
2 ounces goat cheese, thinly sliced or crumbled
1 tablespoon olive oil
salt
pepper
¼ cup white wine or water

Special equipment:
Gallon-size zip lock bag
Meat mallet, rolling pin or heavy skillet
Toothpicks

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease a medium casserole dish (8-inch square, 11 by 7 inch or equivalent). Set aside.

Trim any visible fat and gristle from chicken breasts.

Working with one breast at a time, using your sharpest knife, partially separate tenderloin from breast and open it up from the main part of the breast like a book (the tenderloin is on the left side of the picture above).

Start to cut into the thickest portion of the breast, across from the tenderloin side, opening it like a book as you go (the tenderloin is now on the right side in the picture above). If you start to get too close to cutting all the way through, change the direction of your knife to get back into the meat. Open the two sections of chicken like a book. You should have a large flat piece of chicken.

If necessary, cut into thicker parts of chicken, almost all the way through, to make as large and as thin a piece of chicken as possible. Let the shape of the chicken breast guide you. It might look kind of strange (see above), but when you pound it, the chicken will flatten into one big piece.

Place each breast in the zip lock bag, one at a time, and pound gently with the meat mallet, rolling pin or skillet. You want to make the meat a little thinner and tenderize it, but you don’t have to pulverize it.

Place each flattened breast, pretty side down, on a plate. Set out your sun-dried tomato pesto, shallots and goat cheese next to the plate. Have the baking dish next to your workspace. Have a few toothpicks handy, just in case you need them. You don’t want to have to search for ingredients once your hands are contaminated with raw chicken.

Spread each breast with about a tablespoon of tomato pesto, getting as close to the edge as possible. Divide shallots evenly between breasts. Top with slices or crumbles of goat cheese.

One at a time, roll each breast up long ways, like a cinnamon roll or pinwheel cookie. Place each breast in the prepared casserole dish, seam side down. If chicken won’t stay rolled, secure with a toothpick or two.

Drizzle chicken with olive oil. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Pour white wine or water in the bottom of the dish.

Bake breasts for about 30 minutes, uncovered, until chicken is cooked all the way through and tops are starting to lightly brown. Let chicken rest for 5-10 minutes before serving. Leftovers reheat well in the microwave.

Spaghetti and Meatballs

I had never made spaghetti and meatballs before this past Saturday. I had made fettuccini Alfredo and spaghetti with meat sauce. I had made up my own pasta dishes. I had made eggplant and chicken Parmesan. I had even made my own ravioli, but I had never made spaghetti and meatballs. They just never occur to me when I am planning a pasta meal.

My mom usually made meat sauce to go with spaghetti when I was growing up, which we all liked just fine. I’m not sure why she didn’t make meatballs when we had spaghetti. She made Swedish meatballs sometimes, and she had another meatball dish she made in the pressure cooker, but she never made spaghetti and meatballs.

Calvin is on a beef kick lately, after twelve years of declining to try it. I’m not sure what prompted him to try meatloaf a few weeks ago, but now he would have meatloaf or hamburgers every day if we would let him. He suggested beef for Saturday’s dinner, but we had just had meatloaf and it was too rainy and cold that day to make grilling hamburgers any fun. I suggested meatballs, thinking he would balk at a new dish, but he embraced the idea with enthusiasm. Spaghetti and meatballs it would be.

I figured I would make my basic meatloaf mixture, but replace the ketchup with tomato paste and add Parmesan cheese (from the green can this time, we were low on the good stuff) and a tablespoon of garden pesto I unearthed from the freezer. I used white wine as some of the moisture in the meat mixture. Red wine would have been more traditional, and given the mix a deeper flavor, but it is a migraine trigger for Rich, so white it had to be. Use red wine if you prefer, though the white wine gave the meatballs a fresh brightness that I liked. I baked the meatballs to brown them all at once, and then finished them in tomato sauce on top of the stove while the pasta boiled.

The oven browning was effortless, though I decided mine needed a minute more and got the bottoms a little too brown. They were just shy of burnt, though – I saved them just in time, thanks to the smoke alarm. Not that I like to regularly use the smoke alarm as a cooking timer, but hey, whatever works. Since the meat is so lean, be careful not to bake them too long or they will dry out.

Next time I will double the amount of pesto, which I wrote into the recipe. I liked the basil flavor it gave them and I was wishing for more of it. I also had a stash of roasted garlic, so I used that in both the meatballs and the sauce. You can use raw, minced garlic if you don’t have any roasted garlic on hand.

A further note – if you use a different sauce than the one in the recipe you will have part of a can of tomato paste left over. You can freeze it in one-tablespoon dollops on a plastic wrap lined plate. Once it is frozen, you can peel off the dollops and stash them in the freezer for when you need just a tablespoon or two of tomato paste. It’s much better than finding the paste in the fridge later and wondering how long it has been in there before you pitch it.

The meatballs were a resounding success. Calvin declared that he liked them as much as meatloaf, which is high praise from him. They were rich and meaty, fragrant with pesto and bathed in thick tomato sauce – the perfect meal for a rainy, chilly weekend.

Download or print the recipe here.

Spaghetti and Meatballs
From The Cook’s Life
Serves 4-6

Meatballs:
1 pound ground sirloin
2 tablespoons pesto
1 garlic clove, minced, or roasted and mashed
salt (go easy on this, the cheese is salty)
black pepper
¼ cup dry breadcrumbs
½ cup Parmesan cheese (the stuff in the green can is fine)
¼ cup dry white or red wine, approximately
1 tablespoon olive oil, approximately
2 tablespoons tomato paste (from a 6-oz. can – you will use the rest in the sauce)
1 egg

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Lightly grease a large baking sheet and set aside.

Mix all ingredients together in a large bowl until combined. If mixture seems dry, add another tablespoon of olive oil or wine. Form mixture into 1½-inch balls and place on baking sheet. I got about 30 meatballs out of the mix.

Bake meatballs for 10-15 minutes, or until browned. Watch that the bottoms don’t burn. Let meatballs cool on the baking sheet while you make the sauce.

Sauce:
1 tablespoon olive oil, if you are using raw, unroasted garlic
1 clove garlic, minced, or roasted and mashed
1 28-ounce can crushed tomatoes, no salt added if you can find them
Tomato paste (the remainder of the can you opened for the meatballs)
salt, a few dashes
black pepper, a few grinds
paprika, a few dashes
ground cayenne, a dash or two
2-3 teaspoons packed brown sugar, optional
3-4 teaspoons dried basil
water
OR
2-3 cups of your favorite pasta sauce

For serving:
Spaghetti
Freshly grated Parmesan cheese

If you are using raw garlic, heat the oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add garlic and sauté until fragrant, 2-3 minutes. Add crushed tomatoes, tomato paste and spices to taste. If you are using roasted garlic, just mix all sauce ingredients, except water, together in the skillet. Bring sauce to a simmer over medium heat.

When sauce is simmering, add meatballs and reduce heat to medium low. Gently simmer meatballs in sauce until cooked through – 10-15 minutes. If sauce gets too thick, add a few tablespoons of water until it is the consistency you prefer. Cook spaghetti while meatballs are simmering.

Serve meatballs and sauce hot with spaghetti and Parmesan cheese. Leftovers reheat well in the microwave. You can also freeze leftovers for longer storage – thaw in the refrigerator overnight.

Eggplant Parmesan

Friday was another day for the files. I was booked in the morning to help get ready for the annual rummage sale to benefit the youth programs at our church. Rich and I were planning on a date night that evening, while Calvin attended a lock-in at church to get ready for the sale. I had it all planned out in my head – volunteer at church in the morning, clean house and cook in the afternoon. By the end of the day I would be ready for a relaxing evening at home with Rich – eating eggplant Parmesan and homemade bread.

Plans so quickly went awry. The morning started later than I expected, and with one thing and another I didn’t get home until 3:30. And I was exhausted from sorting rummage sale items all day. All plans for cleaning house flew out the window without much protest from me.

After a short break to chill with Calvin and hear about his day at school, I started on the dough for Middle Eastern flatbread. It was 4:30 by now, and Calvin had to be at church by 6:00 (yes the bread comes together that quickly, it is a marvelous recipe). While the bread was rising I prepped the eggplant for the oven. I bake my eggplant instead of frying it, both to make the dish a little healthier and to streamline preparation. The eggplant went in the oven and I shaped the bread into loaves. The eggplant came out of the oven and the bread went in. A quick minute to assemble the casserole and dinner was virtually ready. The bread came out of the oven, the eggplant went in and I was ready to run Calvin to church for his lock-in.

The drop off portion of the day took just about 30 minutes and I was back in time to whip the eggplant out of the oven before it got too brown. If Rich and I had a different kind of marriage (that no one has had since “I Love Lucy” days, if even then), I would have pretended to be cool, calm and collected as I put dinner on the table, in my heels and pretty dress. Those of you who know me personally can stop laughing now. In the real world that we all live in, I sat down in my old jeans and shared a laugh with my husband about my crazy day. He said all the right things about my herculean efforts to get it all done and never once asked why I didn’t buy a loaf of bread or order take-out for dinner. He is a smart man, as I often say.

If you are smarter than me, you will plan eggplant Parmesan for a slightly less hectic day, but know that it is a dish that you can easily make, even when you are short on time. Trust me.

Download or print recipe here.

Eggplant Parmesan
From The Cook’s Life
Serves 4-6

I don’t like to use the seediest middle portion of the eggplant. This is wasteful, I know, but I really don’t like all those seeds. If you don’t mind them, use all of the eggplant. You may only need one large eggplant if you use the whole thing.

2 cups tomato sauce (use your favorite pasta sauce, homemade or purchased)
1 cup breadcrumbs (I used panko, but you can use any breadcrumbs)
salt
pepper
dried basil
garlic powder
cayenne
paprika
¼ cup Parmesan cheese
2 eggs
2 large eggplants (see head note)
2 tablespoons olive oil
¼ pound mozzarella cheese, grated
additional Parmesan cheese for serving

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Lightly grease one or two large baking sheets. Set aside. Lightly grease a large (9 by 13) casserole dish. Add tomato sauce to dish and set aside.

Place breadcrumbs on a plate or large shallow bowl and add spices to taste. Mix in Parmesan cheese and set aside. In a large shallow bowl or plate, beat eggs until well combined. Set aside.

Peel eggplant, if desired (it’s not necessary, unless the skins are extremely thick or tough) and slice crosswise into ¼-inch slices.

Dip each eggplant slice into egg and then into breadcrumbs, pressing crumbs into eggplant with your fingers. Arrange coated eggplant in a single layer on greased baking sheets. Drizzle eggplant with olive oil. Bake for 15 minutes, or until golden brown and tender when pierced with a fork. If you are using two baking sheets, switch them top to bottom halfway through the baking time.

Lower oven temperature to 350 degrees. Layer baked eggplant in the casserole dish on top of the tomato sauce, overlapping edges slightly. Sprinkle top with grated mozzarella.

Bake for 30 minutes, or until sauce is bubbling and cheese is golden brown. If cheese browns too fast, lay a piece of foil loosely over the top of the casserole dish.

Serve eggplant with extra Parmesan cheese. Leftovers reheat well in the microwave.

Grilled Pesto Chicken Wraps

We are always looking for something different to do with chicken. And if it is easy to make, all the better. These chicken wraps fit the bill – quick to assemble, fairly healthy and easy to customize to everyone’s tastes.

I baked chicken breasts for the wraps, but you can use leftover chicken, or chicken from a rotisserie bird you pick up from the store. An aside on chicken – if I am making baked chicken for dinner I always bake an extra piece or two. After it cools, I shred it and freeze it in ziplock bags for chicken wraps, chicken tacos or fried rice. And use bone-in, skin-on breasts, if you can. Once you discard the skin, the meat is as low fat as boneless, skinless breasts, but it is so much moister and more tender, with a lot more flavor.

We got the inspiration for these from a local restaurant, Crazy Bowls and Wraps. As always, we adjusted the amounts to our tastes, drastically reducing the amount of rice and spinach and using whole wheat tortillas instead of tomato tortillas.

I made my own tortillas for this, making only eight from the recipe and rolling them as big as I could. Obviously not everyone is going to do this, but you might if you try it once. They are easy and contain just four ingredients: white whole wheat flour, salt, oil and water. Try making them sometime and see what you think. They freeze well and are so much tastier than store tortillas. Since you probably aren’t making them this time (I do live in the real world, sometimes), find big tortillas in the store. If you have a choice, pick the thinnest ones available so you don’t end up with doughy tortilla where the edges overlap.

All the amounts are approximate in the recipe. You can use more or less of anything to taste. I had really strong grocery store pesto, so I used the smaller amount. If I had homemade pesto I would probably have used a full tablespoon per wrap. And I didn’t use nearly enough spinach. You can also change the cheese to Parmesan, sharp cheddar or a combination of whatever sounds good to you. Be careful with mozzarella, it can get stringy if you use too much.

Download or print just the recipe here. 

Grilled Pesto Chicken Wraps
From The Cook’s Life
Makes 4 wraps

You can skip the grilling step for a different dish. All amounts are approximate – adjust to your tastes.

4 large whole wheat tortillas (10-12 inch diameter)
2-4 tablespoons pesto
a handful or two of fresh spinach, washed and patted dry
2 cups cooked white rice
2 cups cooked chicken, shredded or cut into bite-sized pieces
1 cup shredded asiago cheese

Preheat a griddle or a large skillet (or two, if necessary) over medium heat.

Spread pesto in a 2-3 inch line down the middle of each tortilla. Layer on about a quarter of the spinach, ½ cup rice, ½ cup chicken and ¼ cup cheese.

Gently wrap edges over filling and place in hot pans, seam side up. Place a flat plate or cutting board on top of wraps to flatten them just a bit.

Heat wraps for 5-7 minutes, or until bottoms are starting to brown. Carefully turn over and heat for another 3-5 minutes, until the tortillas are lightly browned and the cheese is melted. There is no need for the weight after you turn them. Some of the rice might fall out when you turn them; just tuck it back in the ends.

Serve wraps hot.

Bacon Browned Potatoes

Bacon is everywhere, and has been for quite a while now, in bacon peanut butter pie, bacon grilled cheese, bacon and eggs (had to throw that in), bacon-infused vodka, bacon caramels. Some of it goes a little too far – I’m not sure about the bacon vodka. But there is a reason bacon is popular – most of us love salty, smoky things.

We try to limit our bacon consumption, but sometimes we just have to buy a package. When I do have bacon to cook with, I try to use it in small amounts to stretch the flavor without indulging quite so much – a little crumbled on top of baked potatoes or a slice on top of an egg and English muffin sandwich. Occasionally I will save the fat from frying the bacon to use in other dishes. It doesn’t take much and I don’t do it all the time. Sometimes, though, there is no substitute for the smoky, toasty richness you get from bacon fat.

When I was a kid my mom (and just about everyone else’s mom) saved bacon fat in a jar in the fridge. Then the cholesterol-fearing days came and she threw it all out. Gone were fried eggs or roasted potatoes cooked in bacon fat. I still remember how they taste. There really is nothing like a fried egg cooked in bacon fat, slightly brown and flecked with the tiny bits of bacon left in the pan.

I have adapted my hash brown recipe to use bacon fat. If you aren’t interested for whatever reason, try the potatoes cooked in butter (or as Calvin calls them, Slip and Slides) instead. Both recipes are deceptively rich and satisfy any cravings for fat with just a little indulgence. A tablespoon of bacon fat is enough, though two tablespoons are decadence in a skillet. Don’t use more than that or the potatoes will be unpleasantly greasy. I like to use a cast iron skillet for these. I think it browns more evenly. But any heavy-bottomed skillet will do.

Download or print just the recipe here.

Bacon Browned Potatoes
from The Cook’s Life
serves 3-4

1-2 tablespoons bacon fat
3-4 medium baked potatoes (I use leftover potatoes for this)*
Salt
Pepper

Start a skillet heating over medium heat and add the bacon fat. While the pan is heating, peel and dice the potatoes, cutting them into about ½-inch cubes. You don’t have to be precise.

Swirl the pan to cover the bottom with the melted fat and add the potatoes. Spread them out so they are in a single layer and then walk away. Leave them absolutely alone for five minutes before you start to stir. You are working toward a golden brown coating on the bottoms of the pieces.

After at least five minutes, use a spatula to turn the potatoes. Try to turn them all the way over so the tops of the pieces will brown. After another five minutes, stir them around, gently, and let them brown some more. If they are starting to get too brown, lower the heat. Remember, you aren’t going for constant stirring. Let the heat do the work.

Serve your golden brown, crispy, bacon-scented potatoes hot, with salt and pepper to taste.

*If you don’t have leftover potatoes, scrub the potatoes, prick them with a fork and microwave on high for five minutes, or until they are starting to get soft. They don’t have to be all the way cooked, but it is fine if they are. Let them cool a bit for easy handling.

Honey Lemon Plantains

Rich and I had another date night last Friday. We cooked dinner together, ran a couple of errands, picked up dessert (almond tarts!) from a local pastry shop and cafe and caught up on a few of our TV shows. Exciting night, I know, but we had fun. We have been having a lot of date nights lately, as my parents have been very generous with Calvin’s overnight visits. Thanks, Mom and Dad!

We had Caribbean night at dinner, with jerk seasoning rubbed pork chops and baked plantains. We also played reggae music on the stereo – gotta love being able to pick a genre on Spotify. Not sure what the neighbors thought since it was really warm outside and we had the windows open. Our taste of spring and tropical food was a nice change from heavy winter meals and cold weather.

The pork chops were okay, but not really anything special. I think I prefer my jerk seasoning on chicken, which is how we usually do it. I will try to make that sometime soon so I can share the recipe with you. The plantains, on the other hand, were fabulous.

I had never cooked plantains before, so I looked up recipes online. They were all about the same – bake ripe plantains until tender. Some recipes called for peeling and slicing the plantains first, others called for baking in the skin. I opted to peel and slice them before baking. They baked up nicely, smelling slightly of ripe bananas. As they were cooking, they caramelized beautifully, but they were a little bland. I decided to brush them with a little honey and lemon juice spiked with a little cinnamon. That was just the touch they needed.

Plantains will be showing up on our menu fairly regularly now. I liked them as we had them, as a starchy side. I’m sure they would be delicious as a dessert, with much more of the sweet syrup. As they were, they were only slightly sweet, with a very subtle banana flavor, and were a nice foil for our spicy pork chops. We will try them with chicken or fish next time, I think, for a flavor of the Caribbean in the middle of the Midwest.

Download or print just the recipe here.

Honey Lemon Plantains
From The Cook’s Life
Serves 3-4

Ripe plantains are dark yellow with lots of black spots. They will feel slightly soft when pressed, but won’t be squishy like really ripe bananas.

Cooking spray or vegetable oil
2 large ripe plantains
salt
1 tablespoon honey
2 teaspoons lemon juice
dash ground cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease a nonstick baking sheet or line with parchment paper and grease the parchment. Don’t skip this step – the plantains tend to stick. Set aside.

Peel the plantains by slicing off the ends and then slitting the skin with a knife down the side. Peel the skin away from the flesh. Slice the plantain into 1-1½ slices and place cut side down on the prepared baking sheet.

Spray pieces lightly with cooking spray or brush lightly with oil. Sprinkle lightly with salt. Bake for 10 minutes. Turn slices over and bake for another 10 minutes, or until golden brown on both sides and tender when pierced with a fork.

While plantains are baking, heat honey for 15 seconds in the microwave, or until hot. Add lemon juice and cinnamon and stir well. Set aside until plantains are baked.

When plantains are done, brush tops with honey and lemon mixture. Serve immediately with any extra honey sauce on the side.

Lemon Chicken with Rice

As I mentioned last week, we are trying to break out of our routine of the same old dinners night after night. When I was looking for inspiration I read through my master dinner list. It did what I hoped and reminded me of dishes I hadn’t made in a while. Lemon chicken used to appear regularly on the table, but I had forgotten about it. It was one of Rich’s favorites when he was a kid.

I have two different recipes from my mother-in-law for lemon chicken. I can never remember which one we like better. One of the recipes had more handwritten notes on it, so I figured it was the one I made the most often. I made a few more changes and hit on the version that is our new favorite. And this time I typed up the final version so I won’t have to guess what to do next time.

I doubled the lemons in the original recipe and used both the zest and juice to really make it lemon chicken. I also added more chicken broth because we like a lot of sauce. The sauce was slightly too harsh and acidic, but a drizzle of honey took care of that. The honey doesn’t make the sauce sweet at all, but it softens the bite from the lemon just enough to balance the whole thing.

Crispy chicken, just tart enough sauce and fluffy rice – just the thing to break us out of our dinner rut.

Download or print just the recipe here.

Lemon Chicken with Rice
From The Cook’s Life
Serves 4

2 lemons
2 cloves garlic
1 small shallot or ½ small onion
2 cups water
1 cup rice, jasmine or basmati preferred
3 tablespoons canola oil
¼ cup cornstarch, approximately
salt
pepper
3-4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into 1 to 2 inch pieces
1 cup chicken broth
2 teaspoons cornstarch mixed with 1 tablespoon water
1 tablespoon honey, approximately

Zest the lemons and set aside. Juice the lemons and set aside. Finely chop the garlic and shallot or onion and set aside.

Bring water to a boil in a large saucepan. Add the rice and reduce the heat to low. Stir once and cover the pot. Cook rice 15-20 minutes, or until water is absorbed and rice is tender. Keep rice warm until ready to serve.

While the rice is cooking, heat the oil in a large skillet. While the oil is heating, season the cornstarch with salt and pepper. Dredge the chicken pieces in cornstarch, coating all sides.

When the oil is hot, place the chicken in the pan in a single layer. Cook chicken, undisturbed and uncovered, for 4-5 minutes, or until golden brown on the bottom. Turn chicken and cook the second side for another 4-5 minutes.

Cut into the largest piece of chicken to make sure it is cooked all the way through. Cook a few more minutes, if necessary. Remove cooked chicken to a plate and keep warm.

Add garlic and shallots or onion to the pan and sauté until soft – about 5 minutes. Add lemon juice, zest and chicken broth. Bring to a boil, scraping up any brown bits from the bottom of the pan. Simmer sauce for about 5 minutes. Drizzle in cornstarch mixed with water. Stir constantly until sauce thickens slightly. Stir in honey.

Add chicken back to pan and stir gently to coat chicken with sauce, or serve sauce on the side.

Serve chicken over rice. Leftovers reheat well.

A Trio of Dinner Ideas

I am in a bit of a dry spell, both in cooking and writing blog posts. I have been making a lot of old standbys for dinner instead of trying new recipes. This is well and good for easy cooking, but it doesn’t give me much material for the blog. I thought I would highlight a few past posts just in case you also need new dinner ideas. I can’t be the only one who is looking for inspiration. I am hoping that looking back at what I have cooked in the past will give me inspiration for the future.

Citrus recipes are everywhere these days, which is fitting since it is the height of citrus season. We are lucky enough in our modern age to be able to get good citrus fruit year round, but it is truly best in the winter. I posted about citrus roasted chicken back in the summer, but the waning (I hope) days of winter are the perfect time to perk up your plate and palate with the bright flavors of oranges, lemons and limes.

If you are in the mood for something different, try spuds and salads. You can get as fancy as you like when topping your potatoes, or you can keep it simple with butter and a bit of cheese. The same goes for the salad – go all out with winter greens and vegetables, or stick with simplicity. You can whip up the salad and potato toppings in the time it takes for the potatoes to bake, leaving you ready to sit down in no time.

Or you can go the slow cooker route and try garlic pulled pork. Take a few minutes in the morning to throw everything in the pot and you will have tender, garlic-scented pork ready when evening rolls around. Pair it with simple sides, or pile it on buns and you are nine tenths of the way to eating dinner.

Where do you turn when you are out of inspiration in the kitchen? Recipe books, online, takeout menus or somewhere else?

Turkey Veggie Chili

Chili is the perfect dish for dreary, gray winter days. And we have had our share of those lately in St. Louis. I am not complaining, mind you. Compared to the snow our near western neighbors are dealing with, our clouds are a picnic. But I am craving chili and other warming meals.

Chili, for me, is a lunch dish. Rich and Calvin dislike chili with such a passion that I try to make it and eat it when they are at work and school. I make a big batch and freeze it in single serving containers. It is a matter of minutes to thaw a portion in the microwave, top it with shredded cheddar and crackers and dig into the warming deliciousness. Even better if I have homemade bread in the freezer to tear up and drop in the bowl instead of crackers.

I like chili. But I don’t really like cumin. Most commercial chili powders contain cumin, so I made up my own spice combination – paprika, ancho chili powder, ground cayenne and ground chipotle. It may not be for everyone, but I like it. Feel free to adjust the spices to suit your tastes.

I want to enjoy my chili without guilt, so I usually use ground turkey breast for the meat. With all the spices and vegetables I don’t miss the beef. Sometimes I’ll use a combination of lean ground sirloin and ground turkey breast.

I also like to pack as many vegetables into it as I can, so I add celery, carrots, tomatoes, shallots and garlic to the usual beans. I thought about adding zucchini to the mix, but haven’t actually tried that yet. I finely chop the vegetables so they add body and nutrition without announcing their presence so loudly.

Let winter give its last hurrah – I have a stash of chili to get me through until spring.

Download or print the recipe here. 

Turkey Veggie Chili
From The Cook’s Life
Makes 8-10 servings

The canned beans and tomatoes add plenty of salt, so I don’t add any extra.

1 pound ground turkey breast, ground sirloin, or a combination
4 teaspoons paprika
4 teaspoons ancho chili powder
¼ teaspoon ground cayenne, or to taste
¼ teaspoon ground chipotle, or to taste
black pepper, to taste
1 tablespoon olive oil, optional
2 large shallots or 1 small onion, peeled
2 cloves garlic, peeled
3-4 carrots. peeled, if desired
3-4 ribs celery
1 (15 oz.) can kidney beans, drained
1 (15 oz.) can pinto beans, drained
2 (14.5 oz.) cans petite diced tomatoes, undrained
2 (6 oz.) cans tomato paste
1-2 cups water
Cheddar cheese, for serving
Crackers or bread, for serving

Brown turkey or ground sirloin in a large pot over medium heat. Add spices and stir to combine and break up meat.

While meat cooks, finely chop shallot, garlic, carrots and celery, by hand, or in a food processor. Set aside.

Remove cooked meat from pan and drain, if necessary. Return pot to heat and add olive oil if pan is dry. When oil is hot, add chopped vegetables and sauté for a few minutes, or until they start to soften.

Add beans, tomatoes, tomato paste and drained meat. Stir well. Add 1-2 cups of water, depending on how thick you want the chili. Once mixture comes to a boil, lower heat to a simmer and cook for at least 30 minutes. Stir frequently to prevent sticking. Cover pot if chili is reducing too much. Taste chili and adjust seasonings to taste.

Serve with cheddar cheese and crackers or bread. Freezes and reheats well.

Date Night Continued – Citrus Shrimp and Quinoa

We decided to go all out when we were cooking for our date night last weekend and have both an appetizer and an entrée. Our vanilla scallops were such a success that we were sure our shrimp and quinoa couldn’t compete. We were wrong. While not as different as the scallops, it was still as elegant and delicious as any restaurant meal we have had, and we didn’t have to pay restaurant prices or deal with weekend crowds.

Citrus abounds in the stores these days, so I decided to use both a lemon and a tangerine in the shrimp and the quinoa. I was going to make rice, but we eat a lot of rice and I had some quinoa on hand that I had bought and never used. Since we were already in an adventurous mood with the scallops, I decided to continue the theme and try the quinoa.

Everything came together smoothly, with only a few glitches due to making up a recipe as I was cooking it. I should have prepped the citrus before I started cooking the garlic, but I managed to save it before it got too brown. As long as you follow the directions, you won’t be scrambling like I was. Learn from my experience, young grasshopper.

The quinoa turned out nice and fluffy, with the citrus tartness complementing its inherent nuttiness. The shrimp was fabulous with just a touch of garlic, white wine and sweet tart citrus. Not a bad combination to brighten a dark, cold February evening.

Download or print the recipe here.

Citrus Shrimp and Quinoa
From The Cook’s Life
Serves 2, easy to double

1 large lemon
1 tangerine or small orange
1½ cups water, approximately
1 large or 2 small garlic cloves, divided
2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1 cup quinoa
salt
pepper
8 large shrimp, shelled and deveined
2-4 tablespoons white wine, optional

Zest the lemon and tangerine, using only the colored portion of the peel and not the bitter white parts. If you don’t have a zester, use the finest side of a box grater. Set the zest aside. Cut the lemon in half and juice half of it into a 2-cup liquid measuring cup. Cut the other lemon half into wedges and set aside. Juice the tangerine into the same measuring cup. Add water until you have 2 cups of liquid. Set aside. Mince the garlic and set aside.

Heat 1 tablespoon olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. When oil is hot, add half the garlic and sauté until fragrant. Add the juice and water mixture and bring liquid to a boil.  Add quinoa, half of the reserved zest, salt and pepper. Reduce heat to low. Cook for 15-20 minutes, or until liquid is absorbed and quinoa is light and fluffy.

Heat the remaining olive oil in a medium skillet over medium heat. When oil is hot, add the shrimp and the remaining garlic. Cook shrimp 2-4 minutes before turning over. Add a splash of white wine to the pan, if desired, and cook for 2-4 more minutes. Squeeze half of the reserved lemon wedges over the shrimp, reserving the rest for serving. Sprinkle the shrimp with salt, pepper and the remaining citrus zest.

Serve shrimp over the quinoa, with lemon wedges on the side.