Posts filed under 'food'
Third time’s the charm, right?
I am happy to report that my third try at finding a new “staple” recipe was wildly successful. Thank you, thank you, Jamie Oliver! I own several of his books, but haven’t gotten around to cooking many of the recipes yet; I flipped open one of his cookbooks last week to find a seemingly simple chicken dish that looked both tasty and low-maintenance. Here it is, also posted on his website:
Tender and Crisp Chicken Legs with Sweet Tomatoes
First, I must also thank Gloria for taking a long enough nap in the afternoon to enable me to completely prep the dish ahead of time. It only took about twenty minutes — I chopped up a bunch of fresh red, yellow, and cherry tomatoes, a whole bunch of basil, and one red chili pepper. Frances helped me peel the skins from six or seven garlic cloves, and we were ready to roll. I used two packages of skin-on chicken (thighs and legs were all we could find), seasoned them, threw them in a casserole dish, distributed tomatoes over and under them, added garlic cloves, and then covered with saran wrap and put in the fridge.
At around 4pm I slid my totally completed dinner out of the fridge, removed the saran wrap, drizzled it with olive oil, and put it into a preheated oven. My only mistake was covering the chicken for the first hour; the recipe didn’t specify and I was being cautious, but truly I think this is meant to be cooked uncovered. After the recommended 90 minutes at 350 my chicken wasn’t done, so I cranked up the heat to 400 for 15-20 more minutes, and it ended up just right.
This basically makes a nice mellow flavorful chicken with meat that falls off the bone. Jamie recommends serving it over mashed potatoes (which would be excellent) or noodles (which I did, was very good too). I had some fresh parmesan on hand and used that on top. It seems like it is very hard to mess up this recipe (a major plus) and the leftovers were fab. Totally going into our regular rotation and possibly even nice enough to serve to company.
Frances did not eat it due to having a very slight stomach bug, but I am sure she might actually eat some of the chicken in the future; I’m going to go out on a limb and even call this recipe kid-friendly.
So: Allrecipes 0, Moosewood 0, Jamie Oliver 1!
April 18th, 2007
I was feeling so optimistic after making that tilapia earlier in the week. Hey, I can do this! I thought. I can pull it all together AND watch the kids! Well, pride comes before the fall, I guess. It certainly comes before the broccoli mushroom casserole.
I selected this recipe from the Moosewood Cookbook because even though it had a long cooking time (45 mins), it had a relatively short prep time (30 minutes) and I thought I could throw everything together and then relax while it baked. Nice idea in theory, right? Let us just say that on the particular day I made this recipe, I could not accomplish even the simplest task without being interrupted by disaster (aka Gloria).
The prep: Chop one onion. I thought I’d chop the onion early in the day, so at about 10 a.m I put one in the freezer to cut down on crying problems, and then got Utterly Distracted ™ and forgot what I was doing. Thus, when I went to chop the onion at dinnertime, it was still in the freezer. Frozen. On the plus side, a frozen onion does not cause very much crying, and it seemed to behave very much like a regular onion. Still, I was glad the recipe did not call for operating heavy machinery.
Next, chop broccoli. This went… okay. By this point, Gloria, contained in her exersaucer, decided she was done with the exersaucer. I tossed Gerber baby snacks onto the exersaucer to buy myself some time. This extra back-and-forth motion added at least six minutes to the prep time, and Gloria started letting out a bloodcurdling shriek every time she ran out of star puffs.
By the time I got the onions and garlic cooking in a saute pan, the broccoli chopped, the noodles drained, and the rest of the casserole ingredients measured out and mixed, Gloria was in full meltdown mode. Star puffs or no star puffs, she wanted an immediate change of scene, preferably to the high chair with mommy’s full attention and a jar of apples and apricots. I put her on the floor and attempted to distract her with toys, and she crawled off for a moment and allowed me to add the broccoli and mushrooms to the saute pan. While I was stirring the broccoli I heard a thud and a wail. Poor Gloria had slipped and smacked her head on the wood floor; she was fine, but tearful. I now had to complete this recipe with a baby on one hip.
(I must add at this point that while all of this was going on, Frances was sitting in the TV room politely asking for a bowl of grapes every five minutes. The telephone also rang several times, and my contractor came to the door to discuss the fence he was building for us. All of these things added slightly to the prep time of the recipe.)
Finally I put Gloria in her high chair, ignored her wails, and assembled the casserole. My kitchen looked like a bomb had gone off. Eggs and milk and broccoli scraps and cottage cheese containers were all over my counter where I had left them every time one of my kids had demanded my attention. A full forty-five minutes after starting to chop my onion, I finally got the thing into the oven. It looked good. I was ready for the angels to sing when at last I pulled it from the oven. This better be the best casserole in the known universe, I thought.
It wasn’t.
You know, it was fine. If I had made it without any distractions, it would have been a relatively easy recipe, and I would not have expected an orgasmic taste sensation. But I had struggled through forty-five minutes of screaming and wailing and puffy stars in order to get this thing in the oven, and because of this, I had slightly elevated expectations.
It was…. sort of casserole-ish. It required a whole cup of breadcrumbs in the casserole mixture and in hindsight this seemed to be the problem with the taste and texture; they created a slightly bitter paste out of what would have been a creamy cottage cheese sauce. Also, the egg noodles failed to elevate it above the classic Ye Olde Tuna Noodle, or even the exalted Noodle Kugel, both of which are much better. On the bright side, I’m sure I could make a better version of the broccoli mushroom with a few modifications: axe the breadcrumbs, add more seasoning, switch the noodles to regular penne or farfalle, and most importantly, get someone to watch the baby.
Oh, Frances didn’t eat it, either.
In celebration of my culinary adventures, last night we had takeout. I plan on attempting another recipe when I have recovered from the marathon that was Broccoli Mushroom.
April 12th, 2007
Now that my diaper bag obsession is temporarily satisfied, I’m on to the next project: finding new recipes to add to our sadly limited repetoire of weekly favorites. This is not easy; Frances eats only a handful of foods and spends most dinners fidgeting, jumping out of her chair, feeding Cheerios to Gloria, and asking if everyone else is finished eating. Not the most appreciative audience. I’m pretty much cooking for myself and my husband, and if Frances happens to taste a bite of something in between jumps and fidgets, I’ll be happy. Incidentally, if I used Frances’ technique to eat my own dinner, I would probably drop ten pounds in a week.
Requirements for new recipes: They must be easier than easy, require almost no hands-on time, and be able to be prepared one-handed if necessary. (No stir-frys or anything that requires standing over the stove for the duration.) They can involve some pre-prep and assembly, as long as that can take place the night before. This is because at 5 p.m., Gloria is demanding her own dinner, crawling around the kitchen trying to get to the hot oven, crying if I attempt to contain her in the highchair, unravelling the family room rug, putting pieces of lint in her mouth, and disappearing if I take my eyes off of her for less than a minute. She would probably attempt to juggle knives at this hour if given the opportunity. (Thus, the Utterly Distracted Cook.)
First on my list of new dishes to try: Broiled Tilapia Parmesan from Allrecipes.com. I found this dish by clicking on the “top 20 recipes” list; it happens to be #1. With 5 stars and 1,856 reviews, I figured this would be a safe bet; even better, it satisfies my requirements for prep time (like 10 minutes) and difficulty (dead simple).
I was able to whip together the highly caloric butter-mayo-parm mixture while Gloria was playing on the floor, and did most of the actual broiling while she was in her high chair eating Cheerios. On the side: leftover asparagus risotto (gluey glue, alas) and steamed baby carrots with a touch of brown sugar in the hopes that Frances would eat one. (She did. Just one.)
I think the recipe turned out just exactly right; the fish was cooked perfectly and the topping was nicely browned. It looked very pretty on the plate and I had a moment of feeling like Supermom when I served an actual dinner with fish and risotto and a vegetable. And you know, it was… pretty good. Good, but not great. Not five-stars, two-thousand-raving-fans great. It was somehow a little bit too inoffensive, or something. Fabulously easy, but not so memorable. I will probably forget this recipe in a week and never make it again, just because it failed to be compelling. But it was quite tasty, and probably worth trying one more time at some point. Unfortunately, I think it lacks the personality to make it into our regular cast of favorites.
Next up: A Moosewood Cookbook casserole. Hopefully I’ll have time to cook it tomorrow.
April 9th, 2007
Great Pick-Up Foods (for babies just learning to eat with their fingers)
Fruit:
- Watermelon (favorite)
- Mango
- Papaya (look out, it is a laxative)
- Banana (favorite)
- Canned peaches in juice
- Avocado
- Cantaloupe
- Kiwi
- Blueberries
- Pear
Veggies:
- Steamed broccoli
- Steamed baby carrots
- Frozen peas: keep bag in freezer, microwave a handful in a little bowl with water
- Baked sweet potatoes
- Butternut squash*
- Steamed or sauteed zucchini
- Baked winter squash
- Edamame
- Roasted bell peppers
- Asparagus
Grains:
- Cheerios
- Puffed rice
- Whole wheat pita bread
- Homemade pizza: whole wheat pizza dough from TJ’s with melted cheese on it
- Plain bagel
- Steamed white rice
- Whole wheat English muffins
- Bran muffins
- Banana bread
Meat etc:
- Cooked ground turkey
- Meatloaf (made without egg whites)
- Trader Joe’s frozen chicken nuggets
- Sliced deli turkey*
- Baked salmon (only if very moist, watch out for bones)
- Rotisserie chicken
Protein:
- Trader Joe’s eggless egg salad
- Hard boiled egg yolks
- Egg yolks scrambled with cheese and a little bit of water
- American cheese
- Grated cheddar or jack cheese
- Canned low-sodium black beans*
- TJ’s organic baked beans*
- White beans cooked in stewed tomatoes
- Garbanzo beans
Misc:
- Gardenburgers
- Veggie booty
- Hummus
- Quesadillas
- Grilled cheese
- Macaroni casserole (Make spaghetti sauce with ground beef, cook macaroni, combine in casserole dish and melt cheese on top)
- Macaroni with cheese melted on it
- Pizza with ricotta, mozzarella, tomato sauce
- Eggos (with cottage cheese, cream cheese, cinnamon and sugar, or jam)
- Pancakes (after 1 year)
- Pasta with sauce
*Stuff we tried that Frances didn’t like
March 3rd, 2007
