Roasted Chicken Tacos with Mexican Gravy

This weekend, the hubs decided that he was going to buy more tomatoes (because canning 120 pounds of them wasn't enough) in order to try making his own salsa for the first time. It went well, although I think next year we will be making some changes to the recipe. In any event, we wanted to make a dinner dish in order to highlight the salsa and settled on trying to replicate our favorite Mexican restaurant's chicken that they put into their tamales, tacos, enchiladas, etc. The chicken is always so moist, and their seasoning of it is perfect. We obviously don't know the secrets to their sauces and seasoning, but the hubs is pretty good spices and came up with this close - and delicious - mix. We particularly like roasting whole chickens as you tend to get more meat, the price per pound is cheaper, and the meat stays juicier. This also allows you to keep all the juices to make gravy or other sauces with, which is an added bonus. We will definitely keep this method of making taco meat in our recipe-box, and hopefully will branch out from tacos to other entrees to highlight the meat in the future. 

Enjoy! 

Roasted Chicken Tacos with Mexican Gravy

Ingredients

For the spice mixture:

2 Tablespoons chili powder 

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder 

1/2 teaspoon onion powder 

1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

1 teaspoon paprika

1 Tablespoon cumin 

1 teaspoon celery seed 

2 teaspoons salt 

2 teaspoons black pepper 

For the chicken:

1 whole chicken (4 pounds about), fresh or thawed 

1/4 cup of canola or grapeseed oil

2 1/2 cup water 

thickening agent (flour, potato starch, corn starch)

Directions: 

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees 

2. Loosen the skin of the chicken with the back of a wooden spoon. Smear 1/4 cup of canola or grapeseed oil under and on top of the skin. Take 1/2 of the spice mixture and rub it under and on top of the skin.

3. Place the spiced-up chicken in a dutch oven and pour water into the base so that there is about an inch of water under the bird. Cover the dutch oven with a lid and close the oven door (you want to steam cook the bird). 

4. Bake for about  hour 15 minutes (or per the directions with the bird) or until the meat reaches an internal temperature of 165. Would recommend flipping the bird half way through the cooking process. 

5. Take the chicken out of the oven when done. Remove the chicken from the dutch oven, draining any liquid from the cavity of the chicken back into the dutch oven. (Save this liquid for below. Do not discard.) Place the chicken on a plate, cooling rack, or bowl and allow it to cool some until it's at a comfortable enough temperature for you to start to remove the meat from the chicken with your hands. 

6. When it is cool enough, remove the skin from the bird and then use your hands to remove the pieces of the meat from all parts of the bird and place it in a separate bowl. Shred any larger pieces of meat with two forks. 

7. Toss the newly shredded meat with the remaining spice seasoning. 

8. Place the dutch oven with the seasoned drippings from the bird on the stovetop. Turn the heat to medium-high, and allow it to come to a soft boil. Once boiling, whisk in your choice of thickening agent (we use Egg-replacer, which is a potato starch and tapioca start based thickener, but you could also use either potato starch, corn starch, or about 1/4-1/3 cup flour mixed with 1/4-1/3 cup water). Whisk this until the gravy is thickened. Don't worry about bits of chicken in the gravy (yum!). Salt to taste. 

9. Assemble your tacos with your choice of sides:  Guacamole, salsa, onions, peppers, tomatoes, lettuce (or other greens), and/or sour cream. Use the gravy inside the tacos or drizzled over multiple tacos for presentation. 

Wild Rice Salad

Several months ago the hubs and I went to a local museum, where they were highlighting a chef who works for a neighborhood food kitchen. He has brought nutricious, delicious, and free (!) lunches to an area of town that was a healthy food desert. He made this salad to highlight our local Minnesota wild rice, which was so delicious. 

There are many types of wild rice that are commercially available, but we have found that the rice harvested by hand from the northern river beds of Minnesota is the best. Many of the local native tribes are active in the harvest and selling of the rice, which is fun. The native rice cooks the fastest and has the best flavor. We really fell in love with this salad and now make it - and versions of it - frequently at home. Enjoy! 



(Minnesota) Wild Rice Salad

Ingredients

1.5 cups wild rice 
4 cups water 
(1 broth cube)
1 carrot 
1 onion 
3 large swiss chard leaves (or spinach)
1/3 cup chopped mixed nuts (preferably walnuts, almonds, or pecans)
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt 
1/4 cup raisins, dried cherries, or other fruit

Dressing

1 cup cilanto (1/2 bunch)
1/2 cup olive oil 
3 Tablespoons champagne vinegar 
3 cloves garlic 
1/2 teaspoon salt 
1 Tablespoon agave syrup (or maple syrup)
1 teaspoon mustard (stone ground)

Directions

1.) 2-3 hours ahead of time, cook the rice in the water with a broth cube (optional). To do this, bring the rice, water, and broth cube to a boil in a large sized pan. Once it comes to a boil, turn down and cover. Cook on low until the rice is fluffy and soft (how long depends on the rice). Drain any extra water. Place the rice in a medium sized bowl and allow it to sit at room temperature until it's completely cooled. Then, fluff. We have found that putting it in the fridge works against the consistency of the rice and instead we just let it cool to room temperature on the counter. 
2.) 30 minutes or so before wanting to serve the dish, Chop the onion into 1 centimeter pieces. Place some canola or olive oil in a saute pan and over low-to-medium heat, sautee the onions until they are soft, brown, and somewhat sweet. Then, place them aside. Grate/shave the carrot into small pieces. Roll the swiss chard leaves length-wise into a little tube and chop/slice the tube into little strips (chiffonade-style). Chop the nuts. 
3.) Make the dressing by combining all ingredients in a bowl and then mixing with an electric mixer or - even better - an immersion blender until a dressing is made. The most important part of the dressing is keeping the oil to vinegar ratio 3:1 and putting in mustard to help as an emulsifyer. The other ingredients can be played with as you like. 
4.) Assemble the salad by combining the rice, veggies, dried fruit, and nuts. Pour over the dressing and stir all together.

Strawberry Rhubarb Crumble Pie

Rhubarb is something new that I've gotten into since moving to Minnesota. I'm not sure why I never tried it before, but I think it was people constantly saying how sour it was. My mother-in-law made some great dishes, however, so this year when the rhubarb was ripe behind our our 'country' house, Chris picked some for me to experiment with. For my first baking experiment with rhubarb, I wanted something that was a classic, and what's more classic than strawberry-rhubarb pie? Unfortunately, pie is not totally my thing. I don't have the knack for the crust like my Aunt Lori does, and I don't have the talent at lattice work like my mother-in-law. Luckily, though, I came across this recipe by Joy the Baker, and was brave enough to try it. The crust (amazingly!) turned out really flaky and the filling was sweet but not overpowering. Plus, who doesn't love a great oaty crumble on top? (I particularly liked it because it saved me from having to roll out a top!) I decided to bring the finished product into work with me, and let's just say, it was gone by lunchtime. So, if you have some time on an afternoon to bake and putter, then give this recipe a try!

Strawberry Rhubarb Pie
Adapted slightly from Joy the Baker 

Ingredients:

For the Crust:
1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1 Tablespoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt 
1/2 cup (1 stick, 4 ounce) COLD unsalted butter, cut into small chunks
juice of 1/3 lemon
1/4 cup milk 

For the Filling:
3 cups rhubarb sliced into 0.5cm chunk (sorry, we measure skin lesions in millimeters, so that's what I'm used to....) 
1 pound (1 box) strawberries with the green part cut off and then cut in half
1/3 cup light brown sugar
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
large pinch of salt 
2 Tablespoons fresh lemon juice

For the Topping:
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup old-fashioned oats
1/2 cup granulated sugar
large pinch of salt 
large pinch of cinnamon 
6 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into small chunks

Directions:

Make the crust:
1.) In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar and salt. Add the cold butter chunks and either using your fingers or a pastry cutter, work the butter into the flour mixture until the butter pieces are the size of small peas or oat flakes. Pour in the lemon and the milk and use your hands or a fork to bring together coarsely. Don't over do it. You're not kneading dough here. Just try to moisten all of the flour bits. 
2.) Flour a work-surface and dump the pie crust mixture onto the work surface, shape it into a small disk (can be quite coarse), and then wrap that in plastic wrap and put into the fridge for 1 hour. 
3.) When ready, roll out the pie crust on a well floured surface until it's about 1/8 inch thick and 12 inches across. Transfer to a pie plate. Trim the edges and fold with your fingers to make a pretty design. Place in the fridge. 

Make the Filling:
4.) In a medium bowl, toss together the rhubarb, strawberries, sugars, cornstarch, lemon, and salt. Mix until all the fruit/rhubarb is covered with the sugars and cornstarch. Allow to rest as you make the crumble topping. 

Make the Topping:
5.) In another bowl, mix together the flour, oats, sugar, cinnamon, and salt. Add the cold butter chunks and work them into the flour mixture by hand until the butter is the size of peas. 

Assemble the Pie:
6.) Pre-heat the oven to 400 degrees F.
7.) Remove the pie crust from the fridge.
8.) Take a big handful of the topping mixture and put it into the fruit mixture. Stir. 
9.) Pour the fruit mixture into the pie crust. Sprinkle the crumble evenly on top of the fruit mixture. 
10.) Place parchment paper on a baking sheet and place it on the bottom rack of the oven (this will catch any drippings and prevent them from burning and stinking up your oven). Place the pie on the middle rack of the oven (v. important that it's the middle rack). 
11.) Bake the pie at 400 degrees F for 20 minutes, then reduce the heat to 350 and bake for 35-40 minutes longer, or until the pie is juicy, bubbling, and golden brown. 
12.) Remove from the oven and allow to cool for at least 2 hours before serving. This will help congeal the juices and allow them to mellow. 
13.) Serve with vanilla ice cream or store in the fridge. 

This will seriously make your house smell wonderful. 

Homemade Pasta

Maybe the cooking / baking slump is over? Today, I decided for Sunday dinner (by myself since the hubs is up camping with his high school friends) to make pasta from scratch. I had tried in the past to make pasta and always horribly failed or never got it thin enough. Then last year, one of my co-interns, Dr. Erin, kindly invited me over to her house and went through the ins and outs of how to make a great pasta. It took me a little time to get down all the steps again, but once I got my muscle memory going, the pasta turned out great. It's actually quite easy and doesn't take that long once you get the hang of it. The results are so worth it. Homemade pasta tastes so much better than the boxed stuff. Plus, you can throw in any herb or even finely chopped sundried tomatoes to make an exquisite dish. Here's the recipe and the steps: 

Homemade Pasta (basic)

Ingredients:

4 eggs 

4 cups of all-purpose flour 

4-6 Tablespoons of water. 

Directions:

1. Place all ingredients into a bowl or mixer affixed with a dough hook and mix until the ingredients just start to come together into little clumps. It should be VERY crumbly. 

2. Take a about a baseball sized amount of crumbly dough and pack it together into a little flat-topped mound:

3. Squish this mound through your dough machine at the widest setting (mine is 7). It should come out like a really coarse, fat piece of pasta dough:

3. Fold this piece of dough into halves or thirds to make another little packet of dough:

Run this through the pasta machine at the same wide setting. 

4. Now you should have a smoother, but still thick piece of pasta dough. If you don't, keep folding and running the packet through the dough machine at the widest setting until there are no "runs" or other major imperfections in the dough. (It doesn't have to be perfectly smooth, but shouldn't have any holes, etc.) It should look something like this: 

5. Now, once you have a piece of pasta like this, you WILL NOT fold it any more before putting it through the pasta maker. You'll just put one end in and glide it through. So, put the pasta through the maker, again (one more time) on the widest setting to smoothen it out. Then, adjust the setting to the next narrowest and run the pasta through end-to-end (no folding). Keep doing this with one or two passes per each narrowing of settings until you get down a thickeness that you like. (I don't like to use the smallest setting. I usually stop a little before that). It often helps to have two sets of hands helping as the pasta sheet gets longer:  One to crank the machine and one to feed the dough / catch the dough on the other end to ensure that it goes through smoothly. Eventually, you will end up with a REALLY long piece of thin perfect pasta dough! 

6. Now, you can use this piece of pasta to make raviloli or lasagna, or you can run it through the "chopper" part of the pasta maker and make it into strands of spaghetti or linguine. 

7. Once you have your pasta, cut it to the desired length and either boil it right away for 3-4 minutes or hang it on hangers to dry and then store in the fridge for another day. 

Enjoy!! 

Clarence House Bread Pudding

Woah woah. It has been a long time since I last posted. I went through a dry period without much baking - and more working - but now, the tides have turned and I'm baking some old tried and true recipes as well as some new ones. 

This weekend, I just wanted a little something sweet, so I started looking through my recipe book to see if anything caught my eye. A high school friend turned pastry chef gave me her fabulous recipe for bread pudding that I used to absolutely adore when I was home and would visit the restaurant where shed used to bake. She kindly shared the recipe, although it was definitely scaled up for mass production. I just wanted a small taste of bread pudding without making enough for a party, so I tried to scale it waaay down, and to my surprise it worked quite nicely. I ended up with two ramekins of bread pudding:  One for a tasty afternoon snack and one for after dinner. Mmmm. The small sprinkling of chocolate chips on top gives it just enough chocolate to make my taste buds happy, but not enough to take away from the delicious pure nature of the custard. 

It didn't take more than 10 minutes to put together and make. Don't be discouraged if you don't have ramekins either. You could make them in oven-proof tea cups or other small dishes and then place them in a brownie pan with an inch or so of water for the water bath. 

Be creative and enjoy!

Clarence House Bread Pudding - Small Scale Style
From Carla

Makes enough for 2 ramekins. 

2 pieces of toast, toasted until golden brown, crusts cut off, cut into 2cm cubes
3/4 cup heavy cream 
2 1/2 Tablespoons sugar
1 egg yolk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract 
1/4 cup chocolate chips 
1/2 - 1 teaspoon cinnamon 

1. Heat oven to 325 degrees. In a teapot on the stove, start boiling some water. 
2. Place the pieces of cut up toast into 2 ramekins until almost filled to the top. 
3. In a small or medium sized pan over medium heat, scald the cream (until its bubbly). Add the sugar and whisk until dissolved. Don't let it burn / brown. 
4. In a separate small bowl, place the egg yolk. Add spoonfuls of the warm and bubbly cream to the egg yolk while mixing with a fork constantly until the eggs are warmed. Then, quickly, transfer the eggs into the main pan of bubbly cream and whisk whisk whisk to prevent the eggs from clumping. Add the vanilla extract and whisk some more.
5. Remove egg-cream mixture from heat and pour over the toast in the ramekins. Over the top, sprinkle chocolate chips and then cinnamon. 
6. Place the ramekins in a larger, deeper dish. Add an inch or so of boiling water into the pan around the ramekin dishes. Place the whole apparatus in the oven and cook for about 15-20 minutes or until the chocolate chips are melted and the custard is thicker and not runny. 
7. Serve warm. 

PS - I'm sure you could double / triple this very easily to fill more ramekins. Could also try 1/2 2% or whole milk with 1/2 heavy cream. 

Chicken NOODLE Soup

It's been so cloudy in New York recently - and rainy. I guess that's typical for this time of year, but I hate the perma-cloud as I've come to call it. It just drains all my energy and makes me want to sleep all winter: hibernate like a bear. On these dark and damp days, though, nothing warms me up inside and brings a smile to my face quite like homemade chicken noodle soup. While some people really focus on the chicken in the chicken noodle soup, I'm all about the noodles. I find them to be the best part. Chicken, I'm plus or minus on. If I made it, I'll grill it, fry it, or boil it and then shred it and throw it into the soup. There's no right or wrong way to cook the chicken in my mind. Whatever you're in the mood for. It's imperative to have excellent noodles and excellent chicken broth. I buy organic chicken broth. Even if you don't get organic, make sure you get low sodium, otherwise your whole soup just tastes like salt. I personally like the soup overflowing with noodles, but you may or may not like that approach to your soup, so add as many or as few noodles as you like and as many or as few different veggies as you like to mix it up.

While I normally post the recipe below, I'm going to throw a shout out to my favorite recipe-collecting website, cookingfriend.com. You can catch my treasured go-to chicken NOODLE soup recipe there. Enjoy!


Chicken NOODLE Soup

Recipe can be found at CookingFriend.

Seriously Good and Seriously Easy Tomato Sauce

For a long time, I made my own tomato sauce. It was never anything like what the little Italian ladies in my hometown ever made, but it was better than the sugared-up stuff that comes out of a jar from the store. My go-to recipe generally consisted of heating onions and garlic in olive oil, adding quality crushed canned tomatoes plus some seasonings, heating until warm, and then dumping it on pasta.

I was about half-way there, but there were some errors in my ways. First off, I've found that while canned tomatoes are okay to use - especially Italian ones - they have to be canned whole tomatoes, not crushed. Homemade canned tomatoes are the best alternative to ones in the stores, while fresh in-season tomatoes set the gold standard for making great sauce.



Additionally, I hadn't yet found this genius recipe that adds butter to tomato sauce. Olive oil, sure. But butter? I was skeptical until I tried it, but I found it to be supremely delicious.

This will probably be my go-to sauce for awhile - at least until I have to cook for my vegan hubby again. I'm excited to try it as a base with other veggies for a fabulous pasta primavera!


Seriously Good Tomato Sauce
My version of Marcella Hazan's genius recipe - the most popular tomato sauce recipe on the internet

1 1/2 cups homemade canned tomatoes
3 large in season tomatoes (about 1 pound)
(or you could use entirely canned whole Italian tomatoes, about 2 cups worth, instead of homemade or fresh tomatoes)
1 yellow onion, halved
4 Tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 + teaspoon salt

1.) Cut the stems off of the fresh tomatoes. Fill a medium saucepan 2/3 with water and bring to a boil. Plunge the fresh tomatoes into the water and allow them to boil for about 5 minutes or until their skins start to separate from their flesh. Strain the tomatoes then and rinse with cool water. Remove and discard the skins.
2.) In another (or the same now) medium saucepan, place the onion, butter, canned tomatoes, and tomatoes with their recently removed skins. Allow it to come to a simmer and cook for 45 minutes, breaking up the fresh tomatoes every once in awhile with some stirring and mashing with the back of the spoon. Cook down until the sauce is your desired consistency. Remove the onion before enjoying.