Confections of a Foodie Bride

I don’t like dill. He doesn’t care for very much lemon. Neither of us are overly crazy about feta. Normally, a recipe built around those would get vetoed quickly but with such a simple foundation of other Ingredients like pasta and chicken, I’d make this one work. Really, the bonus was that it gets almost no dishes dirty. And since I hate doing dishes, I’d definitely make it work.

It’s a two-cooking dish meal. Solids go in a baking dish, hot liquids are poured over it. Give it a stir and throw it in the oven. The end product is a tangy, creamy, and hearty one-bowl dinner that we both enjoyed. And it’s completely adaptable to any miscellaneous ingredients that you have hanging around.

And can I just say that even after 5 or 6 years and a new baby, it still makes me swoon to hear things like, “I really like how you added sun-dried tomatoes and the panko topping,” coming from my former-Stouffer’s-and-Red-Baron connoisseur. And they say men don’t change.

Creamy Orzo with Chicken and Goat Cheese
1 lb orzo
1 lb chicken breast, cut into 1-inch pieces
1/2 cup sun-dried tomatoes, chopped
6oz log chevre, broken up and crumbled with two forks
2 tsp fresh thyme leaves
Juice from half a lemon (~2 tsp)
4 cups chicken broth
3/4 cup water
2 Tbsp unsalted butter, divided
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground pepper
3/4 cup Parmesan, grated
3/4 cup Panko

Preheat oven to 400. Add orzo, chicken, sun-dried tomatoes, chevre, thyme, and lemon juice to a 2.5-3qt baking dish. Bring chicken broth, water, 1 Tbsp butter, salt, and pepper to a boil. Pour into the baking dish, stirring slightly to mix. Bake for 30 minutes.

Mix Parmesan and Panko together. Melt remaining butter in a small dish and add to panko mixture. Stir the butter into the bread crumbs until well incorporated. Give the dish a quick stir and sprinkle the bread crumb mixture on top. Bake for another 7-10 minutes, until bubbly and browned. Let sit 5 minutes before serving.

Adapted from Everyday Food
Serves 6

Happy Independence Day to my fellow Texans! Or “Frito Pie and Shiner Day,” however you see fit to celebrate.

Jason and I have our ideas about what good chili is - and is supposed to be. Me - ridiculously spicy with no beans or ground beef (cubed beef cuts only). Jason - no beans, thick and loaded with ground beef. My friend Shannon shared her recipe for chili and it looked exactly like something Jason would like.

I stand corrected. Jason loved it. As in, “you don’t have to make that other kind again” loved it. (”That other kind” being my favorite.) I made a quadruple batch - yep, quadruple - before the baby’s arrival and froze it in quart-sized bags. To say we’ve eaten our fair share of Frito Pie around here is an understatement. You won’t hear either of us complain - Shannon knows her chili.

Shannon’s Chili
1lb ground turkey (I used ground beef)
5 cloves garlic, minced
1 large onion, chopped
2 Tbsp chili powder*
1 tsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp ground cumin*
1 tsp Tobasco*
1 (28 oz) can crushed tomatoes
1/4 cup red wine vinegar

*Wild cards. Start with these amounts and then taste after simmering. I usually double the cumin and increase the chili powder by 2-3x. And I pour in the Tobasco until Jason takes the bottle away.

Crumble the ground turkey into a stock pot or large Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add the onion and garlic, and cook stirring frequently until turkey is evenly browned. Drain off excess grease.

Season with chili powder, oregano, cumin and hot sauce. Stir in the tomatoes and vinegar. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low, and simmer for about 1 hour - or longer if you have time. Stir occasionally to prevent burning on the bottom.

…and it’s not DiGiorno but it is frozen pizza.

Frozen pizzas have their appeal - they’re a cheap way to have dinner on the table in 15 minutes. They also have severe drawbacks - the toppings aren’t fresh and a lot of times, even a single slice can be a hidden sodium bomb. With some prep work on a rainy weekend afternoon, you can prepare your own frozen pizzas for those busy days when you need a cheap lunch/dinner on the table in 15 minutes.

To start, you need a good pizza dough. I like this one (yields enough for 4 8-inch pizzas) and this one (two pizzas). Then you need to decide: do I just want to have a frozen crust ready to add some fresh toppings later on or do I want to build a complete pizza with standard (aka, freezable) toppings?

Prepare your pizza dough recipe through the point where you need to shape the dough. Preheat the oven to 500. Sprinkle one or two baking sheets (depending on how many pizzas you’re preparing) lightly with cornmeal. Divide the pizza dough into two or four equal pieces (if using one of the recipes above). Stretch each dough round into a 7-8in round and place on the prepared baking pans. (I take a gallon freezer bag and lay on top of the rounds to test that they’ll fit inside.) Bake the crusts for 5 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool completely.

To freeze the crusts naked: Place the cooled crusts on a baking sheet in the freezer. Freeze through and then place in separate gallon freezer bags. For storage, stack them horizontally or “file” vertically.

To freeze complete pizzas: Transfer the cooled baking pans to the freezer to freeze through. Top the frozen crusts with the sauce, cheese, and freezable toppings of your choice (if you want to use fresh vegetables or other freezer-unfriendly toppings, I recommend freezing the crusts naked or only with sauce/cheese; then add your veggies before putting into the oven on the night-of). Place the baking pan back into the freezer and freeze. Once frozen through, store the pizzas in separate gallon freezer bags.

To cook: Preheat oven to 425. Place the frozen pizza on a pan in the top 1/3 of the oven. Cook for 12-15 minutes, until toppings are bubbly and crust is golden brown.

Fat Tuesday? Already? It’s amazing how adding one little 5lb 13oz munchkin to your household puts “outside time” completely out of reach.

Sausage? Check.
Rice? Check.
Tobasco? Check.
Cornbread? After digging around a bit in the freezer for the bag of madeleines… check!

All those pieces means that we have dinner for a week

This is the only jambalaya recipe that I’ve ever needed. It’s spicy, full of flavor, and full of meat - hearty enough for a one-pot and one-bowl dinner.

Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 medium onions, chopped
2 green bell peppers, chopped
2 tsp salt
1 tsp cayenne
1lb smoked sausage, cut into 1/4 inch slices
1 tsp Tony Cachere’s
1 1/2lb chicken, cut into 1-in cubes
3 bay leaves
3 cups rice (I used half white and brown)
3 cups water
3 cups chicken stock
1 cup chopped green onions

Heat the oil in a large Dutch oven over medium heat. Add the onions, bell peppers, salt and cayenne. Stirring often, brown the vegetables for about 20 minutes, or until they are caramelized and dark brown in color. Scrape the bottom and sides to loosen any browned particles. Add the sausage and cook, stirring often for 10 to 15 minutes, scraping the bottom and sides to loosen any browned particles.

Season the chicken with Tony Cachere’s. Add the chicken and the bay leaves to the pot. Brown the chicken for 8 to 10 minutes, scrapping the bottom of the pot to loosen any browned particles. Add the rice and stir for 2 to 3 minutes to coat it evenly. Add the water and stock, stir to combine, and cover. Cook over medium heat for 30 to 35 minutes, without stirring, or until the rice is tender and the liquid has been absorbed. Remove the pot from the heat and let stand, covered for 2 to 3 minutes. Remove the bay leaves. Stir in the green onions and serve.

Adapted from: The Food Network

There are times when I want dinner to be labor-of-love impressive. Those are the times when you can guarantee that my husband will just want a sandwich for dinner. Darn.

And then there are times when I want dinner to be the equivalent to just getting out of bed that morning. We have cereal and milk in the house? At the same time? We have dinner! And right on cue, he says, “Let’s have steak tonight.” Double darn.

One of my husband’s favorite things to eat, chicken tenders, fall somewhere in the middle. I guess if there’s one thing a girl from the south is supposed to be able to get right, it would probably be frying chicken. Simple food, decently easy prep, and disastrously messy. There are the marinating and dredging dishes, the resting plate, the frying pan, the post-frying pan. And we’re not even counting dinner dishes and utensils yet. Or the gravy pot and baking sheet for french fries… two people, two loads of dishes. The math is simple enough, I guess.

My husband prefers his chicken “plain” along side a bowl of cream gravy and a mountain of french fries. Me? I want those bad boys tossed in wing sauce and served with a ridiculously thick bleu cheese dressing. And hold the fries.

Crispy Chicken Tenders
Vegetable oil
1 cup heavy cream
1 Tbsp vinegar
1/2-1 tsp Tobasco
1lb chicken tenders
1 1/2 cup flour
black pepper
2 tsp Tony Cachere’s Cajun Seasoning

Heat ~1-inch vegetable oil in a cast iron pan/dutch oven to 350.

Place chicken tenders in a shallow dish. Stir cream, vinegar, and Tobasco in a small bowl until just combined. Immediately pour over chicken (it can thicken rather quickly - and it’s okay if it does). Move the tenders around a bit to ensure even coating.

In a separate shallow dish, combine flour, a generous amount of fresh-ground black pepper, and Tony Cachere’s and mix well.

When the oil is ready, move 2-3 tenders at a time from the “wet pan” to the “dry pan.” Dredge in seasoned flour, ensuring complete coverage, shake off any excess flour, and place on a plate. Repeat for as many tenders as you can fit in your frying pan.

Transfer chicken to the hot oil. Fry until golden brown, approximately 3-5 minutes. Flip and fry until breading is golden brown. Remove from the pan and place on a rack sitting over a baking sheet.

Dredge the remaining chicken. Allow oil to reheat before adding any the chicken to the pan.

Yields: 2-3 servings

Football and cheese. And we love them both.

There are several ways to detect when it’s playoff time ’round these parts:

MMMmm. Velveeta. You can say whatever you want to about the congealed block of processed cheeze food - I think it rocks. And it’s the only legal item I can think of that’s measured in bricks, you know, besides real bricks. We use it in this house exclusively for queso:

Chili Queso = 2 cups leftover chili + 1 brick Velveeta.
Quickie Queso = 1 can of RoTel + 1 brick Velveeta.
Not-So-Quickie Queso = see below

And on the rare occasion that I have any left, Velveeta makes a wicked grilled cheese to accompany my favorite tomato soup.

I have a love-hate relationship with homemade queso. I admit that most of the time, I’d rather just go out for it. In the mood for Queso Blanco? Escalantes is the best bet. Want “regular” queso? Get thee to Lupe Tortilla or Texadelphia. Sure, I have to immediately jump in the shower to get the smell of the restaurant out of my hair but it’s worth it.

I have the hardest time getting “real” queso to come together consistently. Chihuahua and asadero cheeses melted with green chiles and sauteed onions… when it works, it’s fantastic but two batches made on the same day with the exact same ingredients and method can yield a 50% failure rate. Velveeta, while not “real” queso - and maybe not even real cheese? - has never, ever let me down.

Not-So-Quickie Queso
8 oz Velveeta, cut into large cubes
1/4 cup milk
1 Tbsp vegetable or olive oil
1/2 cup white or yellow onion, diced small
1-2 large jalapeno peppers, diced (~1/4 cup, I leave the seeds in)
1 tomato, diced
1/4 cup cilantro, chopped
Pinch of salt
Dash of cayenne

Place Velveeta and milk in a medium bowl and set aside.

Heat oil in sauce pan over medium-high. Saute onions and peppers until the onions are translucent. Pour over Velveeta. Microwave for 60-90 seconds at a time, stirring until melted and thoroughly combined. Stir in tomatoes, cilantro, salt and cayenne. Serve hot with chips of your choice or warm flour tortillas.

Pizza is in heavy rotation on our weekly menu. We’re crust people - and I don’t leave a scrap of it behind. Nothing screws up a good pizza like a bad crust. We’ve gone through several pizza doughs looking for the perfect crust and we always come back to The Usual. We’ve been baking pizza with the Gourmet recipe for nearly 4 years now.

Occasionally, I’ll want to try something different and I stumbled across an old bookmark that provided the perfect opportunity: Deep Dish Pizza. Not just any deep dish - one that promised a far less messy outcome than some of my previous attempts.

I swapped out The Usual for Baking Illustrated’s Basic Pizza Dough. The recipe has been on my radar for a while because I frequently see it baked into all kinds of tasty forms on one of my favorite food blogs, Annie’s Eats. The recipe also conveniently yields enough dough in a single batch to get a deep dish pie on the table for dinner.

I was pleasantly surprised. The bread flour for which the Baking Illustrated recipe calls produced a noticeable difference in texture. I’m not sure that I’m ready to completely give up The Usual but this crust is definitely at least the second best pizza crust recipe we’ve tried.

Deep Dish Pizza
For the dough:
1 3/4 cup warm water, divided
1 tsp sugar
1 envelope (2 1/4 tsp) instant yeast
2 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for greasing bowl and springform pan
4 cups (22 oz) bread flour, plus more for dusting
1 1/2 tsp salt

For the pizza:
1 cup pizza sauce
2 cups shredded fresh mozzarella
Fillings of your choice (we used cooked italian sausage, pepperoni, and pineapple chunks)

Put 1/2 cup warm water into the bowl of your stand mixer and stir in sugar until dissolved. Sprinkle the yeast over the top and let stand until frothy, about 5 minutes. Add the remaining water and oil.

Add the flour and salt to the stand mixer bowl fitted with the dough hook. Mix on low until the flour is combined and then turn up the speed and knead until the dough is smooth and elastic, about 5 minutes. Transfer the dough to an oiled bowl (I remove the dough, oil the stand mixer bowl, and put the dough back in… one less dirty dish). Cover with plastic wrap until it doubles in volume, about 1 ½ to 2 hours.

Preheat oven to 400. Turn the dough out onto a floured surface. Divide the dough into two pieces, about 2/3 and 1/3 in size. Gently form into two balls, cover with a damp cloth, and let the dough relax for ~10 minutes. Assemble a 10-in spring form pan and oil the bottom and inside ring.

Shape the larger piece of dough into a round and drape over the springform pan. The dough round needs to be large enough to cover the bottom and slightly hang over the edges of the pan. Use small pieces from the other dough ball to patch any trouble spots.

Sprinkle 1/3 cheese over the bottom of the pan. Top with the fillings of your choice and cover with half of the remaining cheese. Shape the remaining dough into a round and drape over the springform pan. The dough round should also slightly hang over the edge of the pan. Taking a rolling and roll over the top edge of the springform pan to seal the pizza. Tuck the crust edges around the top of the pizza. Using a pair of kitchen shears, cut a few steam holes in the top crust. Spoon pizza sauce over the top and sprinkle with remaining cheese.

Bake for 40-45 minutes until crust is golden and cheese is bubbly and beginning to brown. Remove the pizza from oven and immediately remove the ring from the pan. Cut into wedges and serve.

Yields: 8 wedges
Source: Crust adapted from Baking Illustrated; Springform method from Evil Mad Scientist