Sesame Miso Donabe

The weather is quickly warming up for Southern California but it's been difficult to stop making this sesame miso donabe! IT'S SO GOOD. We started making it when COVID-19 shut the entire world down and we ordered a CSA box to help some local farms who had lost their restaurant contracts stay afloat. The leafy greens were perfect in donabe.

That box was $25, which is a steal for how fresh the vegetables are! When I buy greens from the market, they usually last about a week. One of those Bloomsdale spinach bundles lasted THREE WEEKS before I got to it and it wasn't rotting at all!

This donabe (or you can make it in a regular pot) is totally adaptable with whatever vegetables or thin-sliced meat you have on hand (or seafood). Most of the time when I've made this, it's been totally vegetarian because it was the easiest, and we wanted to use as much of the CSA vegetables as possible. The most important thing is the soup base.

Sesame Miso Donabe
Adapted from Just One Cookbook
Serves 4

3 Tbsp white sesame seeds
6 cups water
1 Tbsp Hon-dashi
3 cloves garlic, minced
4 dried shitake mushrooms
3-4 Tbsp miso paste

Vegetable suggestions:
Spinach
Bok choy
Tokyo turnips
Daikon
Green onions
Assorted mushrooms
Tofu, fish (cut into 1" chunks), shrimp, any shabu shabu meats

Toast the white sesame seeds in a small pan over low heat (no oil or anything required). Make sure it doesn't burn! Grind with a mortar and pestle, not too fine.

Boil the water with the Hon-dashi, garlic and dried mushrooms. Add the tofu and hard vegetables (daikon, carrots, turnips, etc), simmer for 5 minutes. Add leafy greens and quicker cooking vegetables (green onions, mushrooms, spinach, etc), simmer for two minutes.

At this point you can serve hot with ponzu sauce as an option. If you have any seafood/meats, add them now and simmer for three minutes, then serve. The seafood/meats will continue to cook in the hot broth.

Braised Chicken Thighs with Lemon, Olives, Onions

Braising chicken thighs is amazing easy AND one-pot, which is awesome at a time like this when we're stuck in a quarantine. I never realized how many dishes I used when I'm by myself at home. How did two people use five cups throughout the day, just drinking water? What's wrong with us!?

Once you have this recipe down, it's so easy to interchange ingredients to make a whole new dish. Put potatoes or carrots instead of olives! Maybe de-glaze with white/red wine vinegar instead of lemons for acidity. Add cherry tomatoes. The possibilities are endless.

Braised Chicken Thighs with Lemon, Olives, Onions
Serves 4-6

8 bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs
2 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
A bunch of garlic cloves (10, 12, you choose)
2 large yellow onions, thinly sliced
1 lemon, thinly sliced, seeds discarded
2 Tbsp tablespoons fresh oregano leaves
1 cup mixed Greek or green olives
Juice of 1 lemon

Remove the chicken from the fridge at least 20 minutes before cooking to bring it more to room temperature. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Season the chicken generously on both sides with salt and pepper.

In a large ovenproof pan or Dutch oven (able hold all the chicken in a single layer), heat the olive oil over medium-high heat. When the oil is hot, add the chicken skin-side down, and sear until golden brown. Add the garlic cloves to the pan and flip the thighs over. Cook until the garlic is fragrant and has gotten a little brown, 2 to 3 minutes. Remove the chicken/garlic from the pan and set aside.

With the pan still hot, add the onions, lemon slices and oregano, and season with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring often, until the onions have wilted and the brown bits on the bottom of the pan have loosened, 6 to 8 minutes. Nestle the thighs skin-side up in the onion mixture. Add the garlic, olives, and any juices that have accumulated from the chicken resting plate. Squeeze lemon juice over everything and transfer the pan to the oven. Bake for 40-50 minutes. Scatter fresh oregano leaves over the top to serve.

Roasted Chicken with Cranberries and Potatoes

I love buying cranberries during the fall, especially since it used to be hard to find fresh cranberries. Sometimes I get overzealous and find myself with a few extra packets of cranberries when the season is over! So what to do but continue to cook with them? I usually throw the packages in the freezer and pull them out as needed.

I love using the baby tri-colored potatoes shown above, simply because they're pretty. The medley of colors in this dish is insane and would make a great presentation for an dinner party, or just a cozy dinner with your family/friends. The fact that it's one pan is also helpful!

Roasted Chicken with Cranberries and Potatoes
adapted from Half Baked Harvest
Serves 4

4 bone-in, skin on chicken thighs
3 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 Tbsp fresh thyme, chopped
1 1/2 Tsp fresh rosemary, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
zest and juice of 1/2 lemon
1 Tbsp butter
1 lb tri-colored baby potatoes, halved
4 carrots, chopped into 1" pieces
1 cup white wine or chicken broth
3/4 cup fresh cranberries
2 Tbsp brown sugar
2 Tbsp balsamic vinegar

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.

Trim extra fat/skin from the chicken. Rub with 1 Tbps olive oil, thyme, rosemary, garlic and lemon zest. Really get in there with your hands and make sure everything is evenly and thoroughly coated. Season with salt and pepper.

In a large oven-safe skillet, heat remaining 2 Tbsp olive oil. Sear chicken skin-side down until golden, about 5 minutes. Flip and cook 5 minutes more. Remove from skillet.

Add butter, potatoes, carrots and a pinch of salt/pepper. Cook for about 5 minutes, stirring often. Pour in wine and deglaze. Scrape around for all the pan bits and flavors. Simmer for 5 more minutes, until reduced slightly.

Remove from heat and nestle in chicken. Squeeze lemon juice all over.

In a small brown, toss together cranberries, sugar and balsamic vinegar. Sprinkle cranberries over the chicken and transfer pan to oven. Roast for about 20-25 minutes, until chicken is cooked and potatoes/carrots are tender. Serve hot.

* if you are me and love flavors AND your chicken is a bit on the oily side, you can make ANOTHER dish for the next day. We ate the chicken and veggies but didn't use any of the "sauce" at the bottom of the pan because the chicken fat, butter and oil combination made it a bit greasy. I scooped out the chicken and veggies, leaving as much of the sauce behind as I could.

I bought another pound of tri-colored potatoes (halved), 10-15 brussel sprouts (halved), 3 carrots (cut into 1" pieces), and 1/2 onion (sliced) ... and tossed all those together with the flavor bits and chicken fat at the bottom of the skillet. There should be plenty to go around but if you need to, add a couple more tsp of olive oil. Season with salt and pepper, then roast in oven for about 30 min or until tender, stirring once halfway through.

Two dishes for the price of one, and just as pretty. I loved it! Feel free to use whatever veggie combinations you would like, including cauliflower, turnips, butternut squash, etc. OR my other new favorite thing to do is roast leftover crudite platters from parties! Most of the time, there is so much food that the crudite platter is barely touched. Everything is already basically cut up so you can just throw and roast. But feel free to cut into more manageable pieces for stuff like baby carrots, celery and radishes (which I've also discovered is great when roasted).

Kale & Butternut Squash Stracciatella Soup

Ignore all items in the photo except for the soup on the right hand side! The other items were just part of dinner ... Korean potato salad, some veggie that I love but cannot seem to find the name for, and a baked sweet potato.

This stracciatella soup is courtesy of Bon Appetit and is very very low maintenance for nights where you don't want to do too much. But you want soup! Because it's cold! Or as cold as Southern California gets.

Kale & Butternut Squash Stracciatella Soup

Adapted from Bon Appetit

Serves 4

1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil

1./2 onion, sliced

1 garlic clove, minced

8 cups chicken broth

2 cups water

1 butternut squash, sliced into 1/2" slices*

1 bunch Tuscan kale, stemmed and shredded

2 large eggs, beaten

1/2 cup Parmesan cheese

2 cups shredded chicken (optional)

Crushed red pepper flakes and crusty bread (optional)

Heat oil over medium heat in a large pot. Cook onion and garlic until translucent, about 5 minutes. Season with some salt and pepper. Add chicken broth, water and butternut squash. Add some salt and pepper, then bring to a boil.

Lower heat and simmer for about 5-7 minutes, until squash is tender. Add kale, stir thoroughly and let everything cook together for another 5 minutes.

Whisk cheese into beaten eggs along with 1/4 tsp salt, in a small bowl. Stir the soup with a spoon and then slowly drizzle in egg/cheese mixture, from about 6 inches from the top of the pot. Let sit for about 15 seconds, then stir thoroughly into the egg-size pieces you prefer. Less storring means bigger ribbons of egg and more stirring will break them up more. I did a pretty thorough stirring so my eggs look more broken in the photo above.

Season with some red pepper flakes and additional salt and pepper. The cheese in the eggs are salty as well so use a light hand at first. Remove from heat and stir in chicken.

Serve with bread and additional cheese, if desired.

* I find that supermarkets are charging 4-5x the cost of butternut squash, just to peel and cube it for you ($0.99/lb in its original form vs $3.99/lb in prepared form). DON'T FALL INTO THAT TRAP! Buy a medium-sized butternut squash (about 3/4-1 lb) and peel it with any vegetable peeler. Using your largest kitchen knife, slice it in half on a sturdy service. Be careful not to cut your fingers off. Remove the seeds with a sturdy spoon. They're kind of like pumpkin seeds. Slice off the stem and bottom, then place cut-side down on a cutting board and cut into 1/2 in slices.

Cold Oven Method Roast Chicken

This is the easiest chicken recipe using the cold oven method, which I have only recently heard about. So let's get started with your ingredients: an entire chicken (or 4 bone-in, skin on chicken breast halves), 4-5 sage leaves, 2 sprigs thyme, 2 sprigs rosemary, 2 heads of garlic (peeled), one lemon (zest in strips using a vegetable peeler, pepper and coarse sea salt.

Rinse chicken, remove innards and pat dry with paper towels. Rub chicken all over with coarse sea salt, including the inside. Also slip your hand underneath the breast skin and rub salt between the breast and skin as well. Set aside for 15 minutes to "brine" and prepare your pot.

Take a lidded, oven-safe pot and coat the bottom with 2-3 tablespoons of olive oil. Throw in all the herbs, garlic and lemon zest strips.

When the chicken is finished brining (optional: the longer the better, overnight if possible) (I used the brining time to peel all the garlic and prepare the herbs), plop it on top of your herb mixture. Squeeze the lemon juice all over the chicken and do a final sprinkle of salt and pepper over the chicken.

Put lid on the pot and slide it into the oven. Turn to 450 degrees F and bake for 45 minutes. Remove lid and bake for another 15 minutes to brown to top.

Remove from oven and allow to rest for 20 minutes before eating (either warm or room temperature).

The chicken was so juicy and tender this way! The garlic was melted and soft underneath, which accompanied the chicken nicely. The pan juices worked really well over rice, but you may want to skim the fat from the top first (there is possibly a lot of fat, due to the chicken skin).

I love roasting chickens but the issue I have is that you oftentimes have to put down pats of butter on top of the breast to keep it moist, as well as rub the entire chicken down with olive oil. That does give the crispy skin and texture, plus golden browning, that people are looking for in roasts - this method seems to give a more healthy, daily-eating alternative.

Give it a try and see if you like it! I am a convert for real.

Romesco Sauce

Guys. Look at that picture. I know the vegetable looks kind of weird - that's broccoflower, which is a hybrid cross between broccoli and cauliflower (clever, huh?). But don't focus on the genetically mutated cross-bred vegetable, Focus on what's underneath the broccoflower - the romesco sauce. I wanted to eat that sauce with a spoon, in great big mouthfuls. But I refrained cause I'm a lady.

The sauce pairs well with chicken, beef and basically any sort of roasted vegetable. I roasted more cauliflower afterwards and it also tasted great!

Romesco Sauce
adapted from Melissa Clark

2 medium red bell peppers, halved and cored
1 plum tomato, halved
3 garlic cloves, peeled
1/2 cup peeled almonds (or peeled hazelnuts)
1/2 cup panko breadcrumbs
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1 Tbsp sherry vinegar (or combination of Shaoxing wine and red wine vinegar)
1 Tbsp pomegranate molasses or 1 tsp honey
1 1/2 tsp hot smoked paprika
1 tsp kosher salt

Set oven to broil and arrange the bell peppers (cut side down), the tomato (cut side up) and garlic on a baking sheet. Broil until the garlic turns a golden brown, about 3-5 minutes. Turn garlic and broil a couple minutes more. Transfer garlic to a bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Continue to broil peppers and tomatoes until the peppers are charred and blackened, about another 5-10 minutes. Remove to the same bowl as the garlic, cover with plastic wrap and set aside to cool.

In a dry pan over medium heat, toast the almonds. Once they are a light golden brown, transfer to a food processor and pulse until they are broken up (not too fine).

Peel the skins off the peppers and tomatoes, being careful as they are hot. The skins should come off fairly easily, but just try to get most of it.

Combine the rest of the ingredients into the food processor with the almonds. Puree until almost smooth. Taste and adjust seasonings, adding more vinegar, honey or salt as needed. Eat with roasted veggies!

Mustard Broccoli Chicken Salad

Sorry the above picture isn't the best. I cooked half of the contents of my refrigerator last night so there was absolutely no time to take out the nice camera so I resorted to using my phone camera. Plus my coworkers keep asking me for this recipe (Hi Sona! Hi Judy!) so I need to get this post up ASAP!

There are several ways to make chicken breast for this recipe:
(1) Buy a rotisserie chicken from Costco/Ralphs/Pavillions/etc, eat the delicious dark meat and save the breast pieces for this salad
(2) Buy bone-in, skin-on chicken breasts. Rub with a little olive oil, salt and pepper and bake at 350degrees for about 25 minutes. Remove skin and bone, cut the chicken into pieces.
(3) Buy boneless, skinless chicken breasts. Rub with a little olive oil, salt and pepper and cook on the stovetop grill until done. If the pieces are huge like mine were last night, grill for 10 minutes on each side over medium heat and then finish in a 350degree oven for another 10 minutes or so. It's better to grill for skinless/boneless instead of oven roasting because the lack of skin and bone takes away from flavor, which the grill imparts onto the chicken.

Confused? Hopefully not. But the above is a great way to get cooked chicken for all recipes - salads, soups, just to have grilled chicken for a healthy dinner, etc. The recipe below is a rift on a Ina Garten recipe but I definitely health-ied it up.

Mustard Broccoli Chicken Salad
1 1/2 lb cooked and cut chicken breast (about 6 cups)
1 lb broccoli florets
1/2 pint cherry tomatoes, halved
1/4 cup chopped dill or tarragon (to your taste)

Dressing:
1 200g container low-fat Greek yogurt (I used 2% Fage)
1 1/2 Tbsp mayonnaise
3 Tbsp Dijon mustard
3 Tbsp whole grain mustard
1 Tbsp red or white wine vinegar
1/2 tsp pepper
1 tsp kosher salt

Season chicken with salt and pepper (if not cooked yet) and cook. In the meantime, cook the broccoli florets in salted boiling water for about 1.5 minutes, just to get the raw taste out. Drain immediately and either shock in an ice bath or run under cold water for about a minute to keep the bright green color.

Mix the ingredients for the dressing together. If you're cooking the chicken to order then pour about 1/3 cup of the dressing while it's still warm, after you've cut it up. The warmness of the chicken will soak up the dressing.

Combine the chicken, broccoli and tomatoes. Mix in the dressing until everything is moistened and the amount of dressing is to your preference. Gently stir in dill or tarragon to taste. Don't skimp, it makes all the difference!

Honey Mustard Chicken Thighs

OK so my plating might need some work. However, don't let that deter you from making these honey mustard chicken thighs. So so good and quick. I used dark meat, but you can use chicken breast if you prefer - dark meat is just more tender and forgiving to a bit of overcooking.

I never used to like mustard and to some point, I still don't. Whole grain mustard, honey mustard and Dijon mustard are the only ones that I really like. Don't even mention classic American yellow mustard ... blech! I don't know what it is about the taste that is a total turn-off to me. However, I also didn't like blue cheese as a kid and absolutely adore it now. Mustard-lovers, don't write me off yet!

There are very few ingredients in this dish and most can be found in your pantry. Definitely don't skip the shallots though, because they add some awesome flavor to this dish. I actually used two ginormous shallots and couldn't get enough of them. You can serve this dish with steamed rice and steamed veggies ... the sweet and savory sauce left from the chicken is perfect for dredging rice and steamed broccoli through.

Honey Mustard Chicken Thighs
adapted from i am a food blog
Serves 4-6 (depending on the sides)

1/4 cup honey
2 Tbsp whole grain mustard
2 Tbsp dijon mustard
2 cloves garlic, minced
6-8 chicken thighs, bone in and skin on
2 shallots, quartered
1-2 stalks green onion, finely chopped

Preheat oven to 350degrees F.

In a bowl, whisk together the honey, mustards and garlic.

Pat the thighs as dry as possible and season well with salt and pepper. Heat up a large skillet on medium high heat and brown the thighs, skin side down, for five minutes until golden and crispy. Do this in two batches (depending on the size of your skillet) in order to not crowd the pan - you want the chicken to brown, not steam. A lot of fat will render out from the skin.

Place the browned chicken thighs in a large oven-proof casserole dish (it can fit snugly). Scatter the shallots over.and pour on the honey mustard mixture. Bake for about 40 minutes, until the thighs are cooked through. Top with the green onions and serve.

The Walking Dead S3E10 - Homemade Fried Chicken

So generally, I go pretty all out for meals during new The Walking Dead episodes. I find a recipe that's pretty time consuming, plan it out, practically come up with a timeline to schedule everything to be eaten at 6pm (we have DirecTV in Eastern time, so we get to see new episodes first!) and get super excited. Never, ever have I asked Boyfriend what HE wanted. Because who cares, right? Happy live-in-girlfriend, happy life. Or something like.

This time, however, I asked if there would be anything he's interested in me making and he responded with "fried chicken" ... my jaw almost hit the floor. Fried chicken is nothing to scoff at. nor is it easy. But my mind immediately went to a Thomas Keller Ad Hoc recipe.

brining. so much brine.

Colonel Sander's herbs and spices have nothing on Thomas Keller's!

A lot of prep work came with this chicken ... but super easy. Mainly, chicken had to be brined about 12-24 hours ahead of time, then rinsed and dried, and then left to sit out for 1.5-2 hours, to get to room temperature. This ensures that the outside of the chicken won't cook faster than the inside, leaving you with a burned exterior and a raw interior.

When Vanessa asked if I was going to fry in my new Le Creuset cast iron pan (Christmas present!), I told her no ... I was going to deep fry! She then asked "Oh cool, you have a deep fryer?" and I said "Nope, I'm just going to fill a pot with oil" ... she then proceeded to tell me how to put out a grease fire. Smother the flames, don't throw water on it!

With the help of a trusty candy thermometer, I got the oil heated and bubbling to a nice 320degreesF and started frying away. It was a great experience and though the oil bubbled and hissed super loudly, I did not get burned in the slightest.

nicely browned chicken. probably due to the spices and buttermilk.

served with steamed asparagus and Kraft mac-and-cheese

The chicken came out moist and flavorful, if a tad bit salty. Maybe less brining next time? I brined for a total of 20 hours or so, maybe I should cut that down. Boyfriend didn't think it was salty though, and proclaimed it was "one of the best things [I've] ever made" ... always nice to hear. The skin was so crisp and amazing that there were audible crunching sounds when you bit into it ...

Which leads me to the new The Walking Dead episode. I must admit, the crunching from the chicken while watching zombie bashing is seriously a bit unnerving. This week's episode was a bit slow ... and I dislike Dead Lori coming back to haunt Rick some more. Come on, woman! Just leave him alone and let him lead his people. From the trailers, it looks like next week, Rick will have a mutiny on his hands. And the Daryl/Merle abandonment didn't last very long, huh? Actually, the episode was slow ... until the very end. RIP to the best mustache on television. *sad face*

Thomas Keller's Ad Hoc Fried Chicken
as much chicken as you want

Chicken - I used 5 drumsticks and 1 package chicken breast tenders

Brine
8 cups water
1/2 cup kosher salt
2 Tbsp honey
6 bay leaves
1/2 head of garlic, cut horizontally
1 Tbsp black peppercorns
1/4 bunch thyme sprigs
1/4 bunch flat leafed parsley sprigs
3-4 sprigs rosemary
Grated zest/juice of 2 large lemons

Coating
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 Tbsp garlic powder
2 Tbsp onion powder
2 tsp paprika
2 tsp cayenne pepper
2 tsp kosher salt
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

2 cups buttermilk
grapeseed/canola/vegetable oil for deep-frying

Count your hours down and start making the brine. Combine all the ingredients in a large pot, bring to a boil, and boil for 1 minute, stirring to dissolve the salt. Remove from the heat and cool completely before adding the chicken in. It takes about 1-2 hours.

Rinse the chicken pieces and place in the cold brine. Refrigerate overnight or for 12-24 hours. When ready to cook, remove the chicken from the brine, rinse and pat the chicken dry, removing any herbs or spices sticking to the skin. Let the chicken come to room temperature outside of the fridge, about 1.5-2 hours.

Mix the coating ingredients together in a bowl, transfer half to another second and set up a dipping station for easy assembly while battering: chicken, coating, buttermilk, second bowl of coating, tray.

Bring the oil to 320degreeF in a pot deep enough that the oil does not come up more than 1/3 of the way; make sure you have about 2 inches of oil so the chicken piece can submerge fully. It took almost an entire bottle of oil for me to get this, and I just used a medium saucepot (see picture above). If you have a deep fryer then feel free to use it but the saucepot method worked pretty fabulously.

Right before taking the chicken into it's hot oil bath, dip each piece into the coating, patting off the excess, then into the buttermilk and then into the second bowl of coating. Place the chicken onto the tray. I did this in batches, so while one batch of chicken was almost done frying, I'd coat another batch.

When the oil has reached the proper temperature, carefully lower the pieces of chicken into the oil. The temperature of the oil will decrease, so adjust the heat as necessary to bring the oil to proper temperature. Fry for about 13 minutes for the drumsticks, to a deep golden brown, cooked throughout and very crisp. The white meat chicken tenders took about 8 minutes.

Remove the chicken to a wire rack with a baking sheet underneath, so the oil can drip down and the skin won't become soggy. Alternatively, you can just transfer the chicken to a tray lined with paper towels, if you have no wire rack. Sprinkle with coarse salt (optional, I didn't do that).

Let the chicken rest for a few minutes to cool slightly. Be careful biting into it! Eat fried chicken until you explode.

Chicken Breast with Mushroom Sage Sauce

So the Superbowl tonight huh? Unlike my undying love (though this season, it's more like undying anger) for the Lakers, I don't have a football team that I root for. Since Boyfriend is a Patriots fan, I generally just root for them, but since the Patriots weren't playing this time, I could take the "west coast team" and root for the 49ers. Though there was a marvelous comeback, the final score just fell a bit short. Sorry for all my friends that are TRUE 49ers fans. *sad emoticon*

The above dish was not something I made for the Superbowl but something I threw together one night after I went spinning at the gym. Umm, there probably shouldn't have been all that cream (or actually, I made a substitute for heavy cream) in it, and I probably shouldn't have given in to the Boyfriend's request for white pasta, but the sauce was oh-so-good. I would probably recommend mashed potatoes next time, as there was not quite enough to coat a bunch of pasta. Or just doubling up on the sauce.

Chicken with Mushroom Cream Sauce
adapted from Simply Recipes
serves 3-4

3 Tbsp butter

1/2 large onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, chopped

8 ounces button mushrooms, thickly sliced

1 tsp fresh parsley, chopped

1 cup dry vermouth or dry white wine

2/3 cup heavy cream (or substitute)

3 Tbsp chopped fresh sage

1 Tbsp olive oil

1 1/4 to 1 1/2 pounds skinless, boneless chicken tender pieces

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Additional fresh parsley

Melt butter in a large sauté pan on medium high heat. Add onions and garlic, sauté for until fragrant. Add mushrooms and parsley, and sauté for 5-10 more minutes, until mushrooms are a deep brown and the liquid has evaporated. Add vermouth to deglaze, scraping up any bits that may be sticking to the bottom of the pan (that's where all the flavor is). Stir in the cream thoroughly to incorporate. Bring to a boil, lower heat to medium and cook the sauce down until it is thick enough to coat the back of a wooden spoon (about 10 minutes).

In the meantime while the sauce is cooking down, heat olive oil in another large sauté pan on medium high heat. Sprinkle salt and lots of pepper over both sides of the chicken breast cutlets. Add cutlets to pan and cook for about 2-3 minutes on each side, until cooked through. Make sure you don't overcook, as dry chicken breast is all rubbery and gross.

Stir sage into sauce and season to taste with salt/pepper. Pour sauce over chicken to serve.

Serve alone, with mashed potatoes or pasta, or steamed vegetables. I think broccoli would have been great. Garnish with additional chopped fresh parsley. It'll look fancy.

The Walking Dead S3E6 - A Mini Thanksgiving (with Chicken)

Thanksgiving is upon us tomorrow! I tried to tell Boyfriend that I made him a baby turkey, which is why the (chicken) was so small. But he wasn't fooled. Apparently he can just tell the difference between the taste of chicken and turkey! Strange.

I followed the same Thomas Keller Roast Chicken recipe as I had done in the past, but I changed the veggies underneath, as they were a bit undercooked last time. This time, I cut the carrots smaller and in half, quartered an onion and quartered four yellow Dutch potatoes. Also, I cut the butter to rub onto the breast by half. The skin still turken out nice and crispy though. Score!

I made brussel sprouts for the first time, which was awesomely easy to make with the chicken since they both roast at 400degrees F. Then when I took out the chicken and it was resting, I lowered the oven temp to 350degrees F and popped the stuffing in. By the time the chicken finished resting and I carved it, the stuffing was ready! All of this was basically a test on timing for the T-Day showdown.

Yay for mini-Thanksgiving! What did everyone think of The Walking Dead this week? Why is Andrea so weaksauce and slutty? So many questions. This week wasn't as good as two weeks ago, but I think its a lot of setup for the future. Hopefully a huge Rick-Governor showdown ... to say nothing of a Merryl-Rick showdown as well.

On another note, I used the cups that Boyfriend gave me for our three-year anniversary! Don't they look super fancy and golden? I always naturally drink with my pinky up (yea, sorry I'm weird) but I made sure the pinky was super-up when I used this cup! I drank some ginger peach tea that Vanessa gave me and the experience was exquisite.

Roast Brussel Sprouts

1 lb brussel sprouts
1 Tbsp olive oil
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/4 tsp pepper

Preheat oven to 400degrees F. Wash and trim brussel sprouts, removing any withered or yellow outer leaves. Half the large sprouts, or leave them whole if they're small.

Toss brussel sprouts with the remaining ingredients and pour onto a foil-lined baking sheet. Roast for 35-40 minutes, shaking the baking sheet about every 10 minutes, until the sprouts are tender.

The Walking Dead S3E1 - Soy Brined Roast Chicken

THE WALKING DEAD IS BACK!! After a bleak summer without any zombie killings, Boyfriend and I were super excited that the new season was starting. Lookit Carl in the screenshot above, shooting his gun like a seasoned professional veteran, even though he's only eight years old. Anyone else notice how every single shot or arrow fired by the group were all dead-center-head-shots? What kind of crazy Ricktatorship action did Rick employ to whip them all into shape, I wonder.

plates waiting to be filled

This week, for the inaugural dinner, I went with roasting a chicken. Doing something like that seems to only work on the weekends, when you have time to sit around for a couple hours. Otherwise during the week, the only roast chicken I'm eating are the already prepared ones from Ralphs/Albertsons/Costco.

I went through some old emails from Vanessa and tried to find the recipe she had given me via Facebook about two years ago, when she roasted two chickens for Christmas Book Club (Hi Vanessa! Remember that?). Luckily, I was able to find it pretty quickly after searching "chicken Vanessa" in my email account. Although I still think hers was better, the chicken was pronouced to be the best I ever made by Boyfriend.

Served it all nicely cut up with garlic rosemary potatoes, cumin scented roast carrots and a tomato/avocado salad. Along with a couple slices of cake for dessert - cookies'n'cream cake and a strawberry shortcake cake. Yumz.

Then the axe scene happened and it was the first time in The Walking Dead watching history that I totally regretted making any sort of food.

Soy Brined Roast Chicken

Brine:
1 gallon warm water
3/4 cup kosher salt
2/3 cup sugar
3/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup olive oil

6 lb chicken
Soy sauce, rice wine vinegar, toasted sesame oil
Garlic powder, chili powder, fresh pepper, kosher salt

Combine all brine ingredients, stirring until salt and sugar dissolve. Allow to cool to room temperature. Put in chicken and brine for at least 4 hours or overnight. This recipe makes a lot of brine so feel free to put in other chicken pieces as well, or pork chops.

When ready to cook chicken, rinse the brine off, pat dry with paper towels and allow it to come to room temperature (about 30-45 minutes). Preheat oven to 375degrees.

Truss the chicken, if desired. Rub chicken with a layer of soy sauce, a layer of toasted seasme oil, a layer of rice wine vinegar and another layer of soy sauce. Season liberally with a layer of garlic powder, chili powder and fresh pepper and less libarally with a layer of kosher salt (the brine already has salt in it). Cut two tablespoons of butter into 4 slices and lay it over the breast of the chicken.

Bake on a rack in the oven for about 2 hours, if you have a six pound chicken. Roughly estimate to do about 20 minutes per pound, plus a bonus 20 minutes. Baste the chicken every 20 minutes or so with the fat that accumulates at the bottom of the roasting pan, paying especial attention to the breast section.

Let chicken rest for 15 minutes before carving so the juices can redistribute.

Chicken Enchiladas with Tomatillo Sauce

Mexican food is oh-so-delicous but eating out in Mexican restaurants almost always equals 1000+ calorie plates. I think a lot of the calories come from the rice and beans though, because I calculated every ingredient that went into these babies and they come out at a cool 250 calories per enchilada. That's pretty awesome, right?

It is a bit time consuming to make these and will set you back a couple hours so its probably best to make them on a weekend when you have more time. Otherwise you'll have to be content with eating a bit later than usual. But trust me, your family will not mind once they taste these enchiladas filled with chicken, tomatillo sauce and a light sprinkling of monterey jack cheese. Serve with rice and beans, if you want to make them or just some steamed vegetables.

I've decided to do this post in a more step-by-step basis so it's a lot easier to follow along - and so you can see how each step looks. The timeline may be a bit daunting but it's as easy as putting a sandwich together. I've used an entire deli chicken before (like the kind you can get hot from Albertsons/Ralphs/Costco) but this time I had four large poached chicken breasts on hand so I just used those instead as they came out to almost 3 pounds. Boyfriend didn't enjoy poached chicken so I had to think fast to find another way he'd be willing to eat them - bam! chicken enchiladas it was!

Chicken Enchiladas with Roasted Tomatillo Chile Salsa
adapted from Tyler Florence

Roasted Tomatillo Chile Salsa
2 lb tomatillos, husked
2 white onion, peeled, sliced, quartered or whole
8 garlic cloves
2 jalapeno, seeds removed if you want it less spicy (use 4 if you like more spice)
4 tsp ground cumin
2 tsp salt
1 cup chopped cilantro leaves
1 lime, juiced

Extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 medium onion, diced
3 garlic cloves, chopped
1 1/2 tsp ground cumin
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
2 cups chicken stock, storebought
Chopped cilantro leaves
1 deli roasted chicken (about 3 lbs), boned and meat shredded
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
About 14 medium corn torillas or 10 large flour tortillas
1/2 lb Monterey Jack cheese, shredded
Garnish: sour cream, chopped tomatoes, cilantro leaves, avocado

First, make the tomatillo sauce. Preheat oven to 400F. Remove the paper-y husks from the tomatillos and give them a quick rinse. Put the tomatillos, onion, garlic and jalapenos into a baking dish and drizzle with a couple tablespoons of oil, just enough to give everything a light coating so they don't burn in the oven. Roast for about 1 hour, stirring once halfway through. The tomatillos should be soft and bursting a bit.

While the tomatillos are roasting, take time and shred your chicken if you have not done so already. Also grate your cheese through the large holes of the box grater.

Transfer the roasted vegetables and any juices on the bottom of the tray to a food processor. Add the cumin, salt, cilantro, and lime juice and pulse mixture until well combined but still chunky. You may have to do this in two batches (I did because my food processor is smaller); if so, split the spices and cilantro evenly between each batch.

Heat about 2 tablespoons olive oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and cook until soft and caramelized - this should take 5 to 7 minutes. Add the garlic and cumin then cook for a further minute.

Sprinkle on the flour and stir to ensure the flour doesn't burn then gradually add the chicken stock to make a veloute, which is a sort of velvety sauce. Continue stirring over a low simmer until the flour cooks and the liquid thickens. The sauce should look thick when a ladle is dragged through it.

Turn off the heat, add three cups of the roasted tomatillo chile salsa, some additional fresh chopped cilantro (about 1/2 cup) and fold in the shredded chicken meat. Season, to taste, with salt and pepper.

Change the temperature of the oven to 350F and begin assembling the dish. Heat a medium pan over medium-high meat and warm torillas on both sides until lightly browned and pliable (if you don't do this then the tortillas will break when you try to roll them). Additionally (only if you are using corn tortillas, this doesn't work with flour tortillas) you can fry them lightly in oil but that adds WAY too many calories and I don't think it made a discernable difference when I did it once. Take a large baking dish and smear the bottom with some of the reserved tomatillo salsa.

Set up your work station by having a cutting board in front of you, the pan of chicken with tomatillo salsa, the bowl of shredded cheese and the sauce smeared baking dish all in front of you. Then wash your hands (hygiene, people!) and roll up your sleeves, because this will get a bit messy.

Using a shallow bowl, coat each tortilla lightly with the reserved salsa mix. Put a scoop of the shredded chicken-enchilada mix on top of the tortilla followed by a sprinkle of the shredded cheese. Fold the tortilla over the filling and roll like a cigar to enclose it. Using a spatula place the tortillas in the baking dish and continue to do the same with all the tortillas.

Finally pour over some more of the salsa and top with the remaining shredded cheese. Bake uncovered for about 30 minutes until bubbly and cracked on top. Garnish with your choice of cilantro, tomato, sour cream and avocado. Or anything else you like - jelly beans, soy sauce, etc. Whatever.

Ta-da! You are totally finsihed. Using the smaller corn torillas and stuffing them to the max, I was able to make 14 enchiladas. If you use the larger flour tortillas then you will probably make 10-11. Bake them right away or put them in the refrigerator and just pop them in the oven the next day for a quick dinner. I made nine in one pan and five in another, which I gave to Sona and her husband. Enjoy!