Safeway has had some pretty good buys on chicken breast recently so I’ve been busy making lots of different dishes with chicken breast. Today I played around with a Mexican tasting marinade for chicken breast. WOW DID IT COME OUT FORKING GREAT! It is NOT a traditional Mexican marinade but the flavors swing that way. I then pan seared the breast and they were full of juice and flavors. The outside I forgot to write down exactly what I put in my dusting mix but it was a LIGHT DUSTING of masa flour (VERY LIGHT) that was mixed with salt, pepper and Emerils’ recipe for Bam (a cajun seasoning) I just pan seared the chicken in a regular fry pan that I sprayed with non stick canola oil.
recipe for up to 2 pound of skinless boneless chicken breast
2 pounds chicken breast – skinless, boneless, pounded some, butterflied and cut in reasonable sizes – room temperature
4 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons apple cider vinegar
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 large garlic cloves – ground to paste
1 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
1/4 teaspoon ground annatto
1/4 teaspoon coriander
1/4 teaspoon chipotle powder (I buy at Sprouts)
non stick spray
Directions
In a gallon ziplock bag add everything but the chicken first and squish the bag so the liquid is mixed. Then add the chicken and squish it around till the chicken looks all coated. Leave this sit on the counter and squish it around a few times during the hour.
Get your fry pan on medium high heat with non stick spray.
Take maybe a 1/3 of the chicken from the bag and blot them off with paper towels. Season the chicken on both sides LIGHTLY with a seasoned masa flour dust.
Timing will differ but put the chicken in the pan and don’t crowd it too much. Cook the chicken till it looks half way cooked on one side and then flip the chicken over to finish the other side. Timing will differ but with my stovetop and my pan mine took around 5 minutes on one side and around 4 minutes on the other side.
Place either on a cooling rack with a liner or a pan that is lined with paper towels.
Repeat till alll the chicken is cooked.
Serve with fresh cilantro, lime, pickled onions and other vegetables.
Forking AWESOME Mexican Inspired Marinated Chicken Breast
I got these lobster mushrooms so I knew that I had to do something special with them. Lobster mushrooms are different from other mushrooms and do have a faint seafood taste. I thought seafood and that is how I came up with Old Bay Beer Batter and Caper Sauce. They came out delicious but I made about twice as much batter as I needed so I also battered onion rings and a couple small heirloom tomatoes. My idea of serving size might differ from your idea of serving size. For us this made 8 small servings. I used almost a half a pound of lobster mushrooms and one large onion. (I am guessing around a total of 8 servings) I do note that reheated servings did become crisp again when reheated in the oven.
Ingredients for around 8 servings
canola or vegetable oil to fry with (about thumbs length in pot)
1 can beer (I used almost the whole can….the amount of liquid will differ slightly depending on the flour you use)
1 cup flour
1 egg – beaten
1 Tablespoon Old Bay Seasoning – plus extra to dust afterwards
1/2 lb lobster mushrooms cut in strips
1 large onion – thick slices for rings
6 anchovies
1 Tablespoon anchovy oil from can or bottle
2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 lemon – just the fresh squeezed juice
1 garlic clove – ground to paste
1 teaspoon capers
1/4 cup parsley leaves
Directions
Make sauce. Blend together the anchovies, oils, lemon juice, garlic and parsley. Set to the side.
Line a pan or two with paper towels for your fried food.
Get your sauce pot for frying. Fill about a thumbs length with oil. Set it on medium high. Once hot turn down around medium. When oil is ready make the batter. In a big bowl add the flour and old bay seasoning. then add beer and egg and mix well. Do a sample piece first before you fry all of them so you can adjust the flour and beer ratio. It will be very hot so be careful. When you are happy with it drop some mushrooms into the batter and coat them. Shake off excess batter and BE CAREFUL. Use tongs to drop them in the oil. They get done really fast but need to be turned over to brown on both sides. Do the same with the onion rings. Dust lightly with more Old Bay Seasoning. Serve.
Old Bay Beer Battered Lobster Mushrooms and Onion Rings with Anchovy Caper Sauce
I had this big jicama and I wanted to make it into shawarma because Noma That famous restaurant had a celery root shawarma on their menu that was suppose to be amazing. Celery root by me is always old and usually rotten. So I picked a different root vegetable and went with jicama. I didn’t do it the way Noma did their amazing celery root brushing it for hours with lots of fat on a charcoal bbq………but I did mine with the same flavors and almost without fat. I have to say that It came out pretty darn amazing. You should serve it with charred onions and grilled tomatoes, tahini sauce, fresh parsley and either pita bread or rice. My idea of serving size might differ from your idea of serving size. This will make around 6-8 servings.
Ingredients for 6 servings
1 very large jicama – peeled, sliced thin on mandolin
1 smaller head garlic – all cloves ground to paste
1/2 lemon – just the fresh juice
4 Tablespoons apple cider vinegar
4 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon Aleppo pepper
1 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon caraway seeds
1/2 teaspoon ground cardamon
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1 Tablespoon tahini sauce (must be pourable) (tahini sauce)
1 1/2 lemons – just the fresh squeezed juice + a little ice water to desired taste and consistency (tahini sauce)
4 garlic cloves – ground to paste (tahini sauce)
salt to taste (tahini sauce)
fresh parsley
Directions
Set oven to 425 degrees F.
In a small bowl combine the head of ground garlic cloves, lemon juice (1/2 lemon), vinegar, oil, cloves, salt, Aleppo pepper, cumin, caraway, cardamon, thyme, cinnamon, nutmeg, black pepper, cayenne and ginger. Mix well. Add this mixture to the sliced jicama and mix well. Put this mixture in a baking dish. Put this in the middle rack of your pre-heated oven. Keep it in till it browns on the edges about 25 minutes. After it browns flip the vegetables over and brown the underside of the pan for around 25 minutes more so you have more brown edges. During this time you should be cooking up tomatoes and onions for the shawarma.
Make the tahini sauce
In a small bowl add the tahini and ground garlic. Add lemon juice and if desired some ice water for consistency and taste. Add salt to taste.
Top with some fresh parsley and and serve with pita bread or rice.
Thai Style Son-In-Law are delicious and easy to prepare. They are so easy that you don’t need a recipe. They are usually hard boiled eggs that are fried in either lard or coconut oil and are served with fried shallots and a delicious sauce that is made from tamarind, fish sauce and usually palm sugar.
Start by cooking eggs to either hard or less. That means slow boiling 6.5 minutes for somewhat loose. 7 minutes for jammy. Up to ten minutes for hard. Place in ice bath and when cool peel shells and set to the side.
Make sauce. Boil part of tamarind brick. For 5 eggs I used around a thumb sized piece (maybe more but I wasted some). You boil a block of the tamarind and let it get soft. It says that it is seedless but that is a lie because they always have pieces of seed in them. The softened tamarind has to be pushed threw a fine strainer….or some people just use the tamarind water…..but I think it’s to watery that way or I have to reduce too much. This gets mixed with a little bit of some kind of sugar (usually palm or brown sugar) I used a little squirt of honey and fish sauce to taste (I used Red Boat Brand fish sauce) My sauce seemed too loose so I reduced it some. Then set it to the side.
Start by frying up thinly sliced shallots till crisp. Drain on sheet pan lined with paper towels. In the same oil fry up the eggs till they brown some (this is pretty quick).
If you like spicy fried up some hot peppers for the eggs. (Thai peppers would be good here)
Safeway has been offering chicken breast on special at very low prices so I have been taking advantage of that. Here is my marinade recipe for juicy FORKING Delicious chicken breasts. I marinated mine for close to two hours dried them off with paper towels. Then I LIGHTLY dusted them with a very light dusting of seasoned flour. I whipped up the flour mixture real fast and didn’t measure it exactly. It was something like a half cup of flour with maybe 1/2 teaspoon sea salt, heaping teaspoon cayenne, teaspoon paprika, 1/4 teaspoon granulated garlic, 1/4 teaspoon white pepper. Then the chicken got pan seared in a fry pan with non stick spray on medium high heat. The chicken came out FORKING Scrumptious! Everybody will love this. I hate to brag but this came out FORKING GREAT! Very moist and incredibly delicious. Even leftovers and from frozen came out juicy.
Ingredients for up to two pounds of chicken breasts. (8 smaller servings)
2 pounds chicken breast , boneless, skinless, butterflied, pounded, cut in reasonable sizes
4 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons apple cider vinegar
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 large garlic cloves – ground to paste
1 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
1/4 teaspoon paprika
pinch of celery seeds
non stick spray
Directions
Everything except for chicken and non stick spray goes din a gallon zip lock bag. Squish the bag to mix up everything in the bag. Now add the chicken and keep squishing it around till the marinade is all over the chicken. Marinade 1 and no more than 2 hours. Blot off chicken with paper towels.
Get your fry pan on medium high heat. Chicken gets seasoned on both sides with your seasoning of choice or seasoning of choice with a small amount of flour. (Your chicken won’t come out as delicious as mine if you do something different than what I described in the beginning.)
Place chicken in pan but don’t crowd in too many pieces and cook till it looks around half way cooked and then flip over and cook the other sides. Timing will differ but on my stove top in my pan my chicken took around 5 minutes on one side and around 4 on the other side.
When cooked place on cooling rack or pan lined with paper towels.
Serve with vegetables
Forking DELICIOUS marinated Healthy Style HOT Chicken Breasts
Joel Robuchon Style carrots and Jean George Vongerichten carrots are very similar and both feature carrots with cumin and orange so that is what we are doing here. I watched someone on YouTube doing Robuchon style carrots and I thought If I cooked them that much they’d fall apart so I am doing them different and easier. I also used frozen concentrated orange juice since I had it in my freezer for a rich concentrated orange flavor. I do note my idea of serving size might differ from your idea of serving size.
Ingredients for around 10 servings
2 lbs of carrots – peeled and sliced into thinner coins on a mandolin
1 garlic clove – ground to paste
2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1 Tablespoon sugar
2 Tablespoons sweet butter
1 Tablespoon cumin seeds
1/4 cup water
12 oz frozen concentrated orange juice – thawed
1/2 teaspoon piment d’ espelette
1/4 cup fresh cilantro leaves – chopped
Directions
Steam carrots. You can do them stove top or do them much quicker with less mess in a microwave. If you do microwave it’s just- Carrots go in a microwavable bowl. Add 1/4 cup watering cover with plastic wrap. Microwave on high three minutes. Let it sit on the counter.
In a large fry pan on medium high heat add the oil, salt, sugar, butter, cumin seeds,and orange juice concentrate. Cook till it reduces and it’s like caramel. It’s not delicious until the sauce turns to caramel. Drain your carrots.
At this point you can add the garlic, piment d’ espelette and carrots. Cook a few minutes. Add the chopped cilantro and serve.
I got lots of odds and ends in my freezer that I have to use. I also stocked up on chicken breast because Safeway has had them on a sale often. I ended up making something like a pie with chicken breast as the bottom crust. It came out delicious. If you fill the butterflied chicken breast with mostly moist flavorful fillings the chicken should come out moist and flavorful. Depending on the filling you might need to add an egg or maybe two so it holds together. I’m guessing that this makes around 6 servings for most people….. I wrote down everything I made the chicken with but I don’t have exactly how I made the corn bread stuffing topping…because I winged it on Thanksgiving and used turkey drippings instead of oil. You can use any flavorful cornbread…I also used the end of my cranberry pickled beets. You can use a chunky not very drippy cranberry relish as a substitute if you want.
Ingredients for around 6 servings
1 lb chicken breast – butterfly and pound thin
1 lb pumpkin cooked and drained – I used real pumpkin
3 oz chipotle in adobo (fine chop any jalapeño)
1 Tablespoon fancy mustard (I used a dijon with some grain)
1 Tablespoon honey
3 eggs beaten (2 go in the corn bread and one holds together the pumpkin)
8 oz corn bread – cut in cubes
1/4 cup fresh parsley – chopped
bbq seasoning blend (I normally never buy a blend…think I got this was a gift and finally used it…It’s a combination oof salt, garlic, onion, bell pepper, unknown spices, natural smoke and paprika) Chicken gets seasoned well with this on both sides.
non stick spray
Directions
Set oven to 350 degrees F. NOTE I did set my oven at 350 degrees roast. My oven might not be accurate. I think my oven runs slightly less but it’s close enough.
Spray a loaf pan with non stick spray
Season butterflied and pounded chicken breast on both sides and place in pan so it’s like a crust shape.
Add Parsley.
In a medium bowl add the pumpkin, chipotle adobo, mustard, honey and one beaten egg. Mix well and that is next layer.
Next add cranberry or cranberry pickled beets……
In a bowl mix up the corn bread cubes with the two beaten eggs and that is the last layer.
Cover tight with foil and place on middle rack of preheated 350 degree F oven.
Timing will differ because we might not have pounded out the chicken the same. mine was done in 45 minutes. I uncovered mine and put it back in for ten minutes so the top would brown up a bit.
Don’t be alarmed at the juice that is around chicken.
I set mine on counter to cool and then refrigerated over night.
The next day I drained the juice and will serve with the slices.
It came out delicious! Even the chicken is very moist and flavorful from all the flavors.
I was sort of gifted with a lot of cucumbers so I had to make a really nice cucumber salad to eat all week instead of my normal salad. I came across chef Binkley’s recipe for marinated cucumber salad on the web. I figure since he is one of Arizona’s greatest chefs that his recipe has to be really great so I sort of based my recipe similar to his. I do note my idea of serving will differ from yours. For me this will make around 10 lunch size meals. This takes two days to prepare for the pickling.
Ingredients for around 10 servings
12 cucumbers – peeled, seeds removed, cut in slices
2 pickled jalapeños (preferably home made) – chopped
2 cups rice wine vinegar
2 Tablespoons sugar
1/4 cup sea salt
1 cup bell peppers – diced
1 large red onion – sliced paper thin on mandolin
1 cup lime juice
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup sugar
1 Tablespoon salt
3 cups roasted corn
2 Tablespoons fresh parsley – chopped
2 Tablespoons fresh mint – chopped
2 Tablespoons fresh cilantro – chopped
2 Tablespoons scallions – chopped
Directions
Rice wine vinegar, 2 Tablespoons sugar, 1/4 cup salt get mixed together in a large bowl. Add cucumbers and jalapeños. Let sit out around one hour and stir occasionally. Refrigerate separate from other vegetables going into the salad.
Get a sauce pot on medium high and heat up the water, remaining sugar and remaining salt till dissolved. Let cool and mix in lime juice. Pour into the onions mixed with bell peppers. This needs to pickle over night. put it in the refrigerator and put the salad to gather the next day.
Next day put the salad together and serve immediately.
Enjoy!
Marinated Cucumber and Vegetable Salad with Lime Pickled Onions
Special THANK YOU to chef Binkley for posting his recipe on the internet so I could come up with this delicious salad.
I found a page of recipes for Din Tai Fung Style Cucumber Salad when I searched Persian Cucumbers on the web. I read each recipe. Most were the same or similar but a few were different. Since I never tasted Din Tai Fung Cucumber Salad I don’t know what it taste like or what recipe is the most similar. I came up with something that is similar but different. They came out light and refreshing and would be a great appetizer to an Asian Style meal. My idea of serving size will differ from your idea of serving size. I can see two people eating this batch since it doesn’t make much but I can also see this as four lighter small servings.
Ingredients for 4 servings
5 Persian Cucumbers – ends trimmed – cut in inch high chunks
1 1/2 Tablespoon kosher salt (to sweat cucumbers)
3 Tablespoons rice wine vinegar
2 Tablespoons mirin
2 Tablespoons honey
2 teaspoons toasted sesame seed oil
1 1/2 teaspoon chili garlic sauce (or to taste)
splash soy sauce
Directions
In a medium bowl add the cucumber chunks and the salt. Mix well and leave the cucumbers sweat for 20 minutes. Then rinse and dry the cucumber chunks. In a small bowl mix up the vinegar, mirin, honey, oil, chili paste and soy sauce. In a zip lock bag (I only needed a sandwich size bag) add the rinsed off and dried cucumber chunks and the liquid mixture. Try to push air out as you zip lock the bag and refrigerate over night and serve tomorrow.
Safeway had ten pound bags of chicken quarters (8 quarters) on sale for 59cents a pound and I was thinking about a delicious Ethiopian dish I had at Abyssinia Restaurant and Cafe in Phoenix AZ called Doro Wat. It’s the national dish of Ethiopia and is a delicious spicy robust chicken stew served with a hard boiled egg and it normally comes with spongy but light Ethiopian Bread called injera. It might not be for everyone because it is spicy…..but it truly is really delicious. Another thing you must know is that this takes two or three days to prepare. One day to make the onions and to let them cool overnight. Next day cook the chicken. Third day is optional…..I used third day to chill the Doro Wat sauce to remove the fat that comes to the surface (some people might prefer to keep the fat) I make chicken stews all the time but I wasn’t sure of the seasonings that go in Doro Wat so I read every recipe that I could find on the internet for Doro Wat. The base of the sauce besides all the spices are onions. Different people prepare the onions differently but I read on one website that the onions are traditionally cooked in the oven. Anyways I picked the seasonings from the recipe from food.com because the person that wrote the recipe was someone named Zurie from Africa. Also Zurie’s Berbere seemed the most complex of the Berbere Mixtures I came across. I made her stew different because I used whole chicken quarters with skin and bone so I have to cut out all the extra fat that she put into her recipe from using boneless. I also added around a cup of red wine. I read on someone else’s recipe that Ethiopian Mead is normally added to this dish so I got the idea to add red wine. Did a few other minor changes. You might not need to make as much as I did but this freezes well incase you want to know. My 10 pound bag of chicken quarters made 10 four ounce portions of chicken and a little extra chicken. I cut Zurie’s recipe for Berbere in half because she makes enough Berbere for TWENTY POUNDS of chicken. Half is just right for 10 pounds (my bag contained 8 quarters). This recipe makes around 10 servings. My idea of serving size might differ from your idea of serving size.
Ingredients for 10 servings
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon cardamon seed
1/4 teaspoon fenugreek seeds
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground coriander
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon ground clove
1/8 teaspoon ground allspice
1 Tablespoon sea salt
1/4 cup cayenne powder
1/4 cup sweet paprika
10 pounds chicken quarters
3 large sweet onions – fine chopped or grated
1 whole head garlic – peeled – fine chopped (around 13 cloves)
13 oz slow cooked peeled tomatoes (you can use canned but you might need to adjust sugar and or salt)
1 Tablespoon honey
1 cup red wine
1 Tablespoon vegetable soup base (instead of salt is less sodium and adds more flavors)
non stick spray
optional water to thin sauce to your liking
Directions
Get two small bowls. Make the Zurie’s Berbere Spice Mixture.
In one small bowl add all the spice powders (ginger, nutmeg, coriander, cinnamon, clove, allspice, salt, cayenne, paprika). In the other small bowl add all the spice seeds (cardamon, fenugreek). The spice seeds get heated till fragrant. You can do this either in a pan, the oven or the microwave. (I like doing it in the oven best………like 300 degrees 5 minutes). Then the seeds have to cool off. Then you can grind them and add them to the powders and mix well. This is the Berbere Spice Mixture. Set to the side.
Set oven to 350 degrees F.
Spray a large pan or 1/2 buffet pan with non stick spray.
In a large bowl add the onions, garlic, 3 Tablespoons berbere spice, cooked tomatoes, wine, honey and salt. Mix well and add to pan. Cover with foil and cook for an hour. Leave on counter to cool off and blend. Refrigerate over night and cook tomorrow.
Next day cook chicken.
Set oven to 350 degrees F.
You will need about three big pans. Rub chicken all over with all the remaining berbere spice mixture. Lay out the chicken in the pans and add the onion mixture on top of the chicken.
Cover tight with foil and cook still chicken is tender and falling off the bones (skin will not be edible). (timing will differ but this will be 2 hours or slightly less like one hour 45 minutes) While the chicken is cooking you might want to boil some eggs to serve with the meal…..
Use tongs and remove the chicken quarters from the sauce. They are too hot to mess with so you need to let them cool some. At this time you can blend the sauce again to get it smoother. Depending on how thick the sauce came out you might want to add some water to thin it down.
Next part is optional……I like to remove the fat from the sauce so I chill the sauce over night.
The next day.
The fat is easy to remove from the top. You can save it because it full if delicious flavors and can make a delicious dumpling or pastry if you care to.
It’s a Forking Delicious dish!
Ethiopian Style Chicken Stew
A special THANKS to Zurie from www.Food.com for her amazing Berbere Recipe. Without it I wouldn’t have made such a delicious dish.
