Open The Windows!

Do not try this on a cold day - or any day you have to open every window in the house! The final product was soooooo good, but it looked like the house was afire for a while!

What could make the house smoke so much? Well, it certainly wasn't a dirty oven. I cleaned the oven last night - which meant I had to put something in it, today!

Shopping day, yesterday, found me with a couple of my favorite chickens. Murray's. From birth in the scenic Amish countryside, Murray's All Natural Chickens are raised without use of any antibiotics, growth stimulants, pesticides, and hormones. Our chickens are raised over eight weeks in a natural environment that allows our chickens to roam freely in wide open spaces. Murray's Antibiotic Free Chickens are grown in the Blue Mountains in the tranquil Amish countryside of Pennsylvania. Murray's birds eat well, (strictly veggie diet, no antibiotics, no hormones, no growth drugs) and have considerably more space to stretch their wings. In fact their homes are more like avian spas: food and water flow freely and the chickens lounge around as they please. As we say at the farm "the happier the Murray's Chickens are, the better they taste."

Okay, enough of the advert. They ARE great tasting chickens, though!

At their website, I saw a link for recipes, which led me to tonight's Great American Smoke-Out!

The recipe I found is for Salt Baked Chickens with Spring Vegetable and Mushroom Ragout. Now, I wasn't in the mood for 1) cooking 4 chickens, and 2) having vegetable ragout tonight, but the chicken recipe itself intrigued me. I've done some salt-rubbed dishes in the past, but none with chicken. And I just happened to have the fleur de sel!

Salt Baked Chickens

• 1/2 cup fleur de sel, to coat
• 1/4 cup coarse ground black pepper, to coat
• 4 free range chickens (4 to 6 pounds each)
• 1 cup canola oil

Preheat oven to 550 degrees. Mix together the salt and pepper. Rub chicken with oil inside and out, then liberally coat with salt mix. Place chicken, breast-side up, in the oven and cook for about 25 minutes, or until golden brown. The chicken may have to be rotated for even coloring. When chicken is fully browned turn the oven down to 300 degrees. Cover with foil to prevent burning. Chicken will take another 35 to 45 minutes. Chicken is done when one can move the wing back and forth with great ease. Another test is piercing between the thigh and breast and the juices should run clear. Allow chicken to rest for 10 minutes before serving.

The finished product was moist, tender, and perfectly cooked! One of the best roasted chickens I've had in quite a while! Since I eschewed the Vegetable Ragout, I had to have other side dishes, right?!? I mean, chicken is good, but a MEAL requires more! 2 potatoes, boiled and mashed with their skins still on, with butter and sour cream. A simple pan gravy, and steamed broccoli finished it off.

And the great thing about it is - there's leftovers!!!

by Tim Dineen

We Always Eat Well On Wednesday

We always eat well on Wednesday. Wednesday is shopping day, Wednesday is "I'm off work" day, and Wednesday means I can actually spend a few minutes in the kitchen!

Shopping today was a lot of fun because we were out of everything! I didn't go shopping last week because of the trip to San Francisco... no sense buying stuff just to sit in the fridge while we're 3000 miles away. Besides, there was plenty of stuff in the freezer and cupboards to get us through.

Last night I was taking inventory and actually writing a list of basics we needed when I came upon a small package of blue cornmeal. It had been in the cupboard for a while. I think I bought it at the Lancaster farmer's market, but it could have come from any number of places. Anyway... I decided I was going to use it today. I had a few ideas in mind... I have chopped green chilies, there's some cheddar cheese... Muffins or cornbread would work. I was kinda thinking Mexican. I did my shopping without a clear picture in mind (typical...) and came home to figure out tonight's meal. I had everything I needed to go in any number of directions, but I still wasn't quite sure...

And then I came upon a Cornbread Stuffing recipe from Bon Appetit last November. It was perfect! It would use up the ham slice in the freezer, the chestnuts in the cupboard from Christmas... Out with the old, make way for the new! We were having Stuffed Chicken Breasts for dinner tonight!

The full meal was the stuffed chicken breasts served on a bed of Manishewitz extra extra fine egg noodles with a mushroom sauce and escarole braised in white balsamic vinegar and garlic. Oh yum!
Direct from Epicurious...

STONE-GROUND CORNBREAD

This simple, rustic cornbread is best used for making stuffing.

• 1 1/4 cups medium-grind stone-ground whole-grain yellow cornmeal
• 3/4 cup all purpose flour
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 cup whole milk
• 1 large egg
• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

Preheat oven to 375°F. Butter 11x7x2-inch metal baking pan. Whisk cornmeal, flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda in medium bowl to blend. Whisk milk and egg in small bowl to blend. Add milk mixture and melted butter to cornmeal mixture and stir just until blended. Transfer batter to prepared pan; smooth top.
Bake cornbread until tester inserted into center comes out clean, about 25 minutes. Transfer to rack and cool in pan 10 minutes. Turn cornbread out onto rack and cool completely. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Wrap cornbread in foil and store at room temperature.)

CORNBREAD STUFFING WITH HAM, CHESTNUTS, AND SAGE

For convenience, make the cornbread one day before preparing the stuffing.

• Stone-Ground Cornbread
• 6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) butter, divided
• 8 ounces ham steak, cut into 1/2-inch dice (about 2 cups)
• 2 cups chopped onions
• 3 large celery stalks, chopped (about 1 3/4 cups)
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh sage
• 1 7.25-ounce jar steamed peeled chestnuts, coarsely crumbled
• 1/3 cup chopped fresh parsley
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 1/2 cups (or more) low-salt chicken broth
• 2 large eggs
• Nonstick vegetable oil spray

Preheat oven to 350°F. Coarsely crumble cornbread onto large rimmed baking sheet. Toast in oven until slightly dried, about 5 minutes. Remove from oven. Maintain oven temperature.

Butter 11x7x2-inch glass baking dish. Melt 1 tablespoon butter in heavy large skillet over medium-high heat. Add diced ham and sauté until browned, about 6 minutes. Transfer ham to large bowl. Melt 4 tablespoons butter in same skillet over medium-high heat. Add onions, celery, and sage; cover and cook until tender, stirring occasionally, about 10 minutes. Transfer vegetable mixture to bowl with ham. Stir in chestnuts, parsley, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper. (Toasted cornbread and ham mixture can be prepared 1 day ahead. Cover and store cornbread at room temperature. Cool ham mixture slightly, then cover and refrigerate.)

Stir crumbled cornbread into ham mixture. Whisk 1 1/2 cups chicken broth and eggs in medium bowl to blend. Mix into stuffing, adding more chicken broth by tablespoonfuls if dry. Transfer stuffing to prepared baking dish. Dot with remaining 1 tablespoon butter. Spray sheet of foil on 1 side with nonstick spray. Cover cornbread stuffing with foil, sprayed side down. Bake stuffing 40 minutes. Uncover and bake until top begins to brown, about 20 minutes longer.

I more or less followed the recipes (at least as much as I ever follow a recipe...) but used my own homemade chicken broth and I added about a half loaf of whole wheat bread that I cubed and toasted. And another egg, and more broth...

For the sauce I sauteed about 4 oz mushrooms in a tbsp butter and browned them well. Added a bit of flour, then a couple of cups of the aforementioned chicken broth. A shot of garlic powder, and some S&P, and it was ready.

The escarole was a splash of olive oil in a frying pan, added the escarole, a bit of S&P, garlic powder, and a sprinkling of white balsamic vinegar. Cooked it until wilted. It was yummy, too!

Start-to-finish was about 2 hours - and that included making and baking the cornbread. Any and all parts can be done in advance, and it's bake in the oven about 45 minutes!

by Tim Dineen

Please to The Table

There's a new cookbook gracing our humble abode - Please To The Table The Russian Cookbook. What fun!

Now, I'm an Irish kid from San Francisco. My knowledge of Russian and eastern European foods is pretty much limited to vodka and caviar, so what a treat it is to see so many new foods to try! The book covers everywhere from "The Baltics to Uzbekistan" - and that's quite a lot of food! I mean - they're talking some 6 million square miles! The cuisine - and recipes - are as varied as the people.

In just a quick perusal, I've found dozens of goodies I want to try, but tonight I settled on the Pozharskiye Kotleti or, for the English-speaking amongst us, Chicken Croquettes Pozharsky, for the main reason that I had all the ingredients at home already! That, and I have a very vague recollection of a restaurant I worked in back around 1974/5 that served Chicken and Veal Croquettes with a Mushroom Sauce... The Red Chimney... But I digress...

From the book: "These fluffy, delicate ground chicken and veal croquettes are traditionally accompanied by smothered mushrooms. I often serve Mushrooms sauteed with Madeira alongside." I took the authors advice! They were fantastic!

The recipe makes 12 croquettes. I cooked up 8 - 2 each for dinner and the others for lunch tomorrow - and froze the other 4 uncooked.

I actually ground my own chicken and veal because, well... I have a grinder attachment to the KitchenAid, and I already had both chicken and veal in the freezer - but it wasn't ground! Besides, I haven't used the grinder attachment in a while, and I'm sure it was feeling neglected down there in that bottom cabinet! The croquettes were easy to form, but it was a bit of a challenge dipping them in the egg and then the crumbs - but, I had it down after the first few.

The recipe...

• 3 slices whole wheat bread, crusts removed
• 1/3 cup heavy cream
• 1 lb ground chicken breast meat
• 3/4 lb ground veal
• 1 small onion, minced
• 9 tbsp butter, at room temperature
• 2 large egg yolks
• 2 tbsp madeira
• 2 tbsp chopped fresh dill (optional)
• salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
• 1 large egg white
• About 1 1/2 cups unflavored fine, dry bread crumbs
• 2 eggs, beaten, for dipping the chicken
• 4 tbsp light vegetable oil

1) Soak the bread slices in the cream for 10 minutes. Squeeze the bread to remove any excess cream. Then discard all but 3 tbsp of the cream.

2) In a food processor, combine the bread, cream, chicken, veal, onion, 3 tbsp butter, the egg yolks, Meadeira, dill (if using), and salt and pepper. Process for 3 or 4 pulses until well blended but not pureed. Transfer to a large bowl.

3) Beat the egg white until it holds stiff peaks. Gently fold it into the meat mixture. If the mixture seems too loose to form into croquettes, cover, and refrigerate to firm up, 1 hour.

4) have a bowl of cold water ready. Dip your hands in the cold water to prevent the meat from sticking to your hands. Shape the mixture into 12 oval croquettes.

5) Sprinle the breadcrumbs on a cutting board or other flat surface. Dip the croquettes into the beaten egg, then roll them in the breadcrumbs to coat well.

6) Heat 2 tbsp of the remaining butter and 2 tbsp of the oil in a large skillet. Fry 6 of the croquettes over medium heat until crispy and brown, 12 to 15 minutes. The juices should run clear when a croquette is pierced with a fork. Repeat with the rest of the croquettes, adding more butter and oil as needed. Serve immediately.

Serves 6.

I followed the basic instructions, except I mixed it all by hand, since I actually ground the onion and the soaked bread with the chicken and veal (I LOVE my grinder, I have to USE it more often!!) I also refrigerated it for a couple of hours, because I made it early in the afternoon.

Served with mashed potatoes, broccoli, and the mushroom madeira sauce and it was a pretty good nosh!

by Tim Dineen