Go To Meal and Gaming

Remember how I was talking about all my stuff that came over from Alberta recently?  Well mixed in with all those cook books and my kitchen was all my gaming systems.  I have an embarrassing or in other words awesome collection of games and gaming systems.  Yesterday was all about the Xbox and Xbox 360.  Gamers out there will know what I'm talking about when I say revisiting old favourite games after years of not being able to play them is a special treat!  DDR and Spongebob anyone?

This game is best played with another 'real' person as it is played in teams and well we should probably interact with a flesh and blood person every now and then.

Anyway, onto the good good food.  So when I'm feeling uninspired and lazy I have a few old reliable meals that I know will be satisfying and hardly any work.  I don't make them often but they are always successful so they are my go-to meals.  In particular fried potatoes fit into this category for me.  I remember my mom making these for us as kids and often we would ask for this meal.  She would usually make these with ground beef fried with onions and I do too when I have ground beef.  Add a side of canned corn and I'm in heaven.  I have called this a ketchup meal because ketchup goes good on everything on the plate.  Honestly, if you haven't done ketchup on canned corn you are missing out!  I have since grown up a little and only put ketchup on my potatoes (usually).  Let get started.

Peel some spuds.  The last bag of potatoes we bought wasn't that great.  Lots of spots and such to get rid of and my poor potatoes ended up looking funny but they cooked up just fine.

This is also a great time to break out my mandolin.  It is really under used but I appreciate it every time I get to use it.  Thinly slice all those funny look spuds.

Heat up some oil in a nice heavy bottom pan.  You will use more than you think but you can add more as you go.  Just get a healthy (haha) dose in the pan to get you started.

I seasoned these sliced potatoes heavily with seasoning salt and pepper and let them get to work.  They will be crispy on the bottom, soft in the middle and slightly salty all over.  Let these sit and develop the crust then turn them over to expose that golden base.  Mix them around to develop as much crust as possible.  Keep an eye on them, they burn easily, especially if you run out of oil in the pan.  Add more oil as you need to keep developing that lovely crust.  If you are in a rush you can cover the pan to help the potatoes steam and cook faster.  Be sure to take the lid off halfway through to prevent having soggy potatoes.  Keep an eye on that crust development though, seriously, it is the best part!

Now that our spuds are underway it is time to think about the chicken.  I have recently discovered oven fried chicken.  I make a seasoned flour usually using the spices here from my ribs rub but I will throw in something extra, substitute, and mix it up.  I have also done just lots of seasoned salt, pepper, and paprika into about a cup of flour which is really nice too.  This is where you can get creative.  Everything goes pretty much.

Here we have two lovely chicken thighs.  The chicken thigh is my favourite cut.  It's juicy, flavourful, the skin is always evenly crunchy. Just good stuff.

Here is my coating.  I like the way the flour and spices crisp up but if you really want to get crunchy put the spices into some panko instead of flour or a mixture of the two.  You won't be sorry.

Evenly coat the chicken.  I find that I don't need a liquid to get this coating to stick.  If you do, go ahead and dip into some milk, shake off the excess then dip into the coating.  Bake in a hot (400F) oven for about 30 minutes or just let them keep going until the potatoes are done.  I start them skin side down and turn them over when the skin is golden and crunchy.  I usually start these by heating the pan up in the oven with about 6 tbsp of butter (hence the oven fried bit).  I then place the coated chicken into the hot fat and bake them that way.  Extra deliciousness ensues but also extra fat.  If you want to go lighter just omit the butter step.  The chicken will bring it's own fat to the cooking process.

I didn't have corn but I couldn't skip the "healthy" part of this meal so I tossed some peas on and just let them come to the boil then turned them off.  No mushy peas for me, thanks.

The end product is a piece of my childhood.  The ketchup is a requirement, it just isn't the same without it.  This dish is so "Canadian" to me.  When I think of Canadian food I always think poutine, Alberta steak, maple syrup, you know, those things.  But this is what I should think.  

So simple, so good!

Veggie and Chicken Curry with Cranberry Quinoa.

Until recently I was in Germany.  Last summer I moved back to Canada and now we are in Ontario.  Before that I was living in northern then southern Alberta.  I had packed up much of my stuff already from a previous move.  When I decided to go to Germany I put all my things into storage and hopped on a plane.

Now that we are back in Canada we had to get all that stuff from Alberta to Ontario.  Stuff like my entire kitchen, all my cook books, everything.  All I took to Germany was clothes, computer, and the books I need to finish my study.  We hired movers who loaded my stuff onto a train and 5 weeks later it's here.

Now that I have all my stuff back I'm really digging in, like using cook books that I haven't seen in over three years.  I have an old slow cooker I bought at a garage sale year ago and have really been wanting to break it out and revisit that wonderful feeling of knowing my meal is making itself with little effort from me.

As you can see I have a bit of a selection, I have a lot of cook books.  Some would say it's a problem, I say, I haven't bought any for years and I'M SO BEHIND!  

All I knew for sure when I was going through these books looking for options was that I'm out of potatoes, I wanted it to be mostly if not entirely veggies, and I also needed something to do with two chicken thighs I had left over from the previous night.

I found a recipe for a veggie curry but I was missing a lot of the ingredients.  I did a massive veggie shop awhile ago now but I'm getting low.  I felt that I could modify the recipe really easily to use what I had.  I will be making this again, it turned out great.  I would be interested to try it as the recipe suggested but this way was just fine too.

Gather all your ingredients, or at least what you have that you'll be using, heh.  Chop up the onion and pepper into bigger pieces, the carrot into coins, and the celery into one inch long bites.

First, I mixed up the curry, coconut milk, and flour.  Set aside. 

I figured the chicken would happily stew under the veggies with all that yummy sauce so I just lightly seasoned them on both sides and tossed them in first.

The recipe called for garlic and ginger.  Unless I need big pieces for some reason I usually use a grater to take care of these.  Just peel back what you think you'll need of the ginger and get it going.  I always peel and leave the end on the garlic when grating it.  You have something to hold onto that way and just chuck that bit away when you get down to it.  I grated these both straight into the sauce.

Just toss all those chopped veggies in on top of the chicken.

Now the sauce.

My good friend Laura made a wonderful dish for me that had roasted chicken, apricots, raisins, and veggies with this dreamy sauce.  I loved it.  I wanted to get something sweet to go along with the coconut milk sauce that I just knew was going to be awesome.  I remembered that I had raisins and craisins in the cupboard and thought they would be pretty good, sweet and tart, just what I was looking for.  I also wanted to get some quinoa going so I looked up a recipe for quinoa and cranberries.  I found this recipe that wasn't a perfect fit but was close enough.

I use two cups of water, 2/3 cup craisins and 1/3 cup raisins and got that boiling before I put in one cup quinoa and 1/2 tsp salt.  

Part of this recipe called for 1 tbsp each oil and lemon to be added to the cooked quinoa so I prepared that so I wouldn't forget to add them.

Let that cook for 20 minutes until the germ part of the quinoa is clearly visible and all the liquid is absorbed.  The fruit re-hydrated some and swelled up to sweet and tart little gems.

Check on your veggies and chicken.  I let this cook about 4.5 hours total.  It made my whole house smell amazing!

This was so satisfying.  Phoenix loved it.  The curry, the veggies, the sweet and tart hits in the quinoa.  This is going to happen again.  The chicken was so tender and flavourful.  The lemon and oil in the quinoa just brought it back to life and gave it a really satisfying feeling in your mouth.

Veggie Tempura And Oven Roasted Ribs Oh My!

For Valentine's day we ordered in a selection of Indian/Thai cuisine.  Nothing was really noteworthy except the tempura shrimp and veggies we had.  I had been thinking about them since and toying with the idea of how hard it would be to make my own.  Well, it turns out it's easy, super easy, ridiculously easy and oh so tasty. This dish happens to be completely Vegan but you could use shrimp, thinly sliced chicken strips, beef or pork.  Really it would be good on anything, it's just a nice light batter that gets really crispy!

First you need to decide what veggies you will use.  I used broccoli, zucchini, and pumpkin.  Some veggies cook really quickly, like zucchini, so it is ready to go as is.  I blanched the broccoli and drained it really well to give it a head start.  I tossed the pumpkin in some oil and roasted it in the oven for a bit to get it going as well.  I also put my oil on first thing so it would be ready when I was.  I don't have a deep fryer so I used a nice heavy bottom pan and canola oil.

Mix up your tempura.  I used this recipe.  I made my own seltzer water using my Soda Stream.  Don't forget the flour (not pictured).

I used chopsticks for mixing and cooking, it is just so much easier and less messy.  This makes such a nice smooth and light batter.  It will be quite runny, that is what you want.

The oil should be nice and hot.  Stick the tip of a chop stick into the oil to test the temperature.  If you see bubbles come out in the oil from the chopstick you are golden.  Start frying in batches.  You don't want to crowd your pot because it will cause the oil temperature to drop and you'll end up with soggy oil logged veggies, not good.  Keep an eye on these.  You can see the batter browning nicely, you will need to be able to turn the veggies over and cook both sides.

I kept a pan in the oven to keep the finished veggies warm and crisp.  They are best served immediately.  There is a dipping sauce that is slightly sweet that we were served when we ordered tempura veggies but I was missing the ingredients to make it so we used soya sauce.  It was delicious.

I served these veggies as a side to my oven roasted pork ribs.  Shout out to my Grandma for teaching me how to make these.  I have since made them my own with my own dry rub.  I get them going about midday if I want them for supper because they need all day in the low oven to get delicious. 

For my rub, I put about 1 tsp of each of the following spices with the exception of the smoked paprika and garlic powder I put 2 tsp of each.  I sprinkle the entire lot all over the ribs and put them in at about 300F for 5-6 hours.  I usually turn them over about halfway through the cooking time. In the last 30 minutes of baking I will slather on my favourite BBQ sauce but it can also just be put on the side for dipping too which is what we usually do.

The spices I used are: seasoning salt, onion powder, chili powder, smoked paprika, cayenne pepper, black pepper, and garlic powder.  You can use this mix on anything really.  I use this blend for my oven fried chicken (mixed with 1 cup flour) and even potato wedges!

Sorry for the bad photo but don't those look good?!

This was such a satisfying meal.  I would say to be sure to cook the zucchini last because they didn't not hold up in the oven and to cook them really quickly.  They went mushy by the end of the meal.

Crescent Cherry Cheese Cobbler

I seen this recipe on Facebook one night and showed it to Chris who said, "don't toy with me woman".  I took that as a, "damn that looks good" and planned accordingly.  Thankfully, I saved the recipe to my awesome foods board in Pinterest because I can never find anything I want off Facebook later.  This really couldn't be easier or tastier.  For real!

Get everything together and close by.  This is so quick you will love it!

Whip the room temperature cream cheese and 3/4 cup of sugar together.  I used my stand mixer, super easy!  Add in the vanilla and this layer is done.

Open the crescent rolls and spread half of it on the bottom of a buttered pan.  Try to seal the cuts and get it right out to the edges.

Now spread that cream cheese heaven you just created.  Get it to the edges too.

Bring on the cherries!  How good does this look already?!

Now the top.  Roll out the rest of the crescent roll dough and do the same as the bottom.  It was a bit stuck together where the roll started but I pulled and pinched gently to get this. 

Now melt some butter.

Brush the top with butter and the reserved sugar to make a nice sugary crust.

Bake it for 30 minutes at 350F to get this golden delight. 

Oh Mama, this was precious.  It was very good.  The only change I would do would be to make my own pie filling and make it a bit tart as this was really sweet.  The ice cream sure helped to cut the sweetness and pushed this dessert over the top!

Have any of you tried to make tempura veggies?  I'll share my experience with you tomorrow.  I made tempura for the first time in my life this past weekend.  It was interesting.

Pancakes!

My family loves breakfast.  I make bacon, eggs, and toast (from my home made bread) like nobody's business.  I love making Egg's Benny, hashbrowns from scratch, waffles, crepes, anything breakfast.  We love french toast, we just LOVE breakfast!  Here is my best pancake recipe that I always use.  I will add berries in the batter or make a fruit syrup for the top.  We aren't fussy.

Sometimes, I use butter but I always have oil on hand so that is what I usually use.

As usual, gather your supplies:

Mix it all up together and grab your ice cream scoop.  This is hands down the easiest way to deal with this batter unless you put it into a squirt bottle.  We only do that when we want to get creative though.

This is one scoop worth of batter.  If you were using fresh berries you could add it now to the top of the cooking pancake.  I have also added chocolate chips before.  It can be very sweet with the syrup so go easy on the chips.

Once you have those bubbles coming up all through the middle of the pancake it's time to flip. 

Look at those beauties!  Now that I have my stand mixer I can whip a batch of these up in about 5 minutes and they are Phoenix's favourite breakfast!  Add butter and syrup and serve hot!  I have cooked a couple cups of fresh fruit with 1/2 cup of sugar and 1/2 water to make a nice light syrup instead of the standard pancake syrup.  The possibilities are endless.  We also like fresh cut fruit on the side too.  We aren't fussy!

You cannot have a bad day when it starts out this good!  I made a killer dessert this weekend that I'll share with you all tomorrow.  

Parmesan Asparagus and Green Thai Curry

Happy Monday!!

We finally have weather that isn't -20C!  I don't mind that it is snowing, I'm just happy the air doesn't hurt my face.  All my stuff arrived from Alberta on Friday.  I haven't seen some of this stuff since 2009 when I packed it away.  I was super happy to get my kitchen back.  Now my kitchen is FULL plus I have my stand mixer back.  YAY!

Remember when I said to watch out for Thai green curry with chicken?  Well it was nothing special.  I used a new paste that I have never used before.  The flavour wasn't strong but the spice was so I didn't end up using enough to have it very flavourful.  I have used pastes in the past that were very very spicy so I was playing it safe.

Here is how it went.

Get your rice cooking.  I use one cup Jasmine rice and two cups of water.

Get that to a boil then turn it down to simmer while you get the rest of the meal cooking.

 

On the side, I'm making parmesan asparagus.

I just toss the asparagus in some oil, season with pepper and parmesan cheese and into the oven. There is no need for salt as the cheese is quite salty.

Here is what we are putting in the curry.  Green Thai curry paste, coconut milk and chicken breasts.

I start the chicken cooking with coconut oil.  It is great in this dish.

Get the paste into the oil and let those flavours out.  I used 2 tbsp of the paste but I would double it next time.

Once it starts to get all bubbly like this you are ready to add the coconut milk.

Here we go with coconut milk, it looks like a mess but it's going to be great.

Once you get the milk mixed in you can add your chopped chicken.

Let the chicken cook for about 10 minutes.  Keep an eye on your rice and asparagus too!  Add some frozen peas a few minutes before serving.

OOOOOH! Look at that asparagus! YUMMY!

Guten Appetite! As I said the sauce wasn't as flavourful as I would usually have it but it was still good!  That asparagus though!

I have been making pancakes quite a bit lately too so that is going to be my bonus post for today.