Chicken Paprikash

Edit: this recipe gets and “ehh” from me.  It smelled wonderful as the chicken browned, but the taste was pretty boring–sorta like cheap italian red sauce that happened to have chicken in it.  I’ll have to do more research before I try it again, especially given the smell of the browning chicken.

Stolen almost verbatim and slightly repentantly from chow.com. I got my hands on some excellent hot paprika from my friend’s visiting German boyfriend awhile back.  So far, I’ve only used it to good effect in polenta, but here’s a traditional-ish recipe.  The only major changes I made were to use 6 drumsticks instead of a whole chicken and to leave out sour cream because I really have almost no place for that stuff in my life.

Calorie Estimate: 2400 (without noodles or sour cream)

INGREDIENTS

• 6 chicken legs (1.75 lbs)
• Kosher (coarse) salt to taste
• Freshly ground black pepper to taste
• Garlic powder to taste
• Dried oregano to taste
• Sweet or hot Hungarian paprika
• 4 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 medium-size onions, finely chopped
• 2 to 3 cloves garlic, crushed
• 1 can (28 ounces) whole tomatoes, coarsely chopped, juices reserved
• 1 can (6 ounces) tomato paste
• 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes (if using sweet paprika)
• 2 large green bell peppers, stemmed, seeded, and chopped
• 1 pound white mushrooms, sliced
• 1 cup nondairy sour cream (optional)
• Hot cooked egg noodles, for serving

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Season the chicken on both sides lightly with salt. Then lightly sprinkle pepper, garlic powder, and oregano over the chicken. Finally, season with the paprika—very liberally if using sweet, a light sprinkling if using hot. Set the chicken aside.
2. Heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in a Dutch oven or other large, heavy pot over medium heat. Add the onions and cook until soft, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic, cook, stirring, for 1 minute more, and then transfer the onions and garlic to a plate.
3. Raise the heat to medium-high and add the remaining 2 tablespoons oil to the pot. When the oil is quite hot but not smoking, add the chicken pieces and brown them on both sides, 3 to 4 minutes per side.
4. Remove the chicken from the pot. Stir the tomatoes with all their juices, tomato paste, the reserved onion/garlic mixture, and the red pepper flakes (if using sweet paprika) into the pot. Return the chicken to the pot, making sure to cover all the pieces with the sauce. Simmer, covered, for 30 minutes. Add salt and pepper to taste. Add more paprika if desired too.
5. Add the bell peppers and mushrooms and continue to simmer, covered, until the chicken is cooked through, 20 to 30 minutes.
6. Just before serving, remove the chicken from the pot and keep it warm. Add the sour cream, if using, to the sauce and heat it over medium-low heat, being careful not to let it boil. Serve hot, spooning the sauce over the chicken and noodles.

http://www.chow.com/recipes/27903

Vichyssoise

Merry Christmas!  I got to try out my new stick blender today.  “Food Network” brand, feels pretty wimpy, but it definitely got the job done.  This potato and leek soup came out smooth and tasty. A classic vichyssoise has only leeks and potatoes, no fennel or bacon.  But why not add fennel and bacon? The stick blender makes it easy to puree the soup, which is very necessary for texture.  This would not be the same as a chunky homestyle soup.  I served it warm for dinner with a half-ounce of blue cheese melted in, but the classic presentation is cold as an appetiser.  I’ll have to try that tomorrow with some of the leftovers.

Calorie Estimate: 1400

Ingredients

• 1 lb leeks, sliced 1/4 inch rounds, white and green
• 1 lb yukon gold potatoes (or other waxy potato), coarse dice
• 1 fennel bulb, chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, mashed
• 1 T butter
• 1 oz bacon/prosciutto/pancetta, diced
• 4-6 cups water (optional, and not necessary: chicken stock)
• salt (a few t)
• pepper (about 1-2 t)
• parsley or chervil (1-2 t dried, 2 T + garnish fresh)
• 1 cup heavy cream (could use less, could use half-and-half)
• optional, but awesome: 1/2 oz blue cheese per bowl

Alternate Version (1000 Calories)

• minus cream (I have my reasons!)
• plus parsnip
• 6 oz of bacon

Preparation

1. Over medium high heat, start to brown the butter and render the pork.
2. Add the leeks, garlic, and fennel, and sweat but don’t brown for a few minutes.
3. Add the potatoes and the water (enough to just cover completely) and bring to a boil, then turn to a simmer.  At a teaspoon or so of salt at this point and some black pepper.  Cook for about 30 minutes until the potatoes are cooked.
4. Take the soup off the heat and let it cool for a minute or two.  Add the cream and parsley.  Take the stick blender and blend until somewhat smooth.
5. At this point, adjust the seasoning.  I needed quite a bit of salt and some more pepper to make it pop, but that’s just me.  As you add seasoning, blend it a bit more, and keep tasting until it’s right.
6. If you’re serving it warm, an awesome tip I picked up from a comment in Mark Bittman’s blog Bitten is to place a small piece of blue cheese at the bottom the bowl.  It’ll rapidly melt, so stir it into the soup before you eat.  This adds a really nice touch of complexity that would otherwise be missing and really made the soup feel special.

Olive and Sundried Tomato Tapenade

Taken from Love and Olive Oil.

Calories: 1200 (hard to estimate +-200)

Ingredients

• 2 cups pitted olives (mix of Nicoise, Picoline, black, etc)
• 1/4 C sundried tomatoes
• 1 T capers
• 1 clove garlic
• 1 anchovy fillet (or 1/2 T anchovy paste)
• 1/4 C olive oil
• 1/2 T fresh basil
• 1/2 t thyme, dried
• 1/2 t parsley, dried
• 1/4 t oregano, dried

Preparation

1. Pulse everything in a food processor until reasonably smooth, or reasonably not smooth, whatever you like, adding oil as you go (start dry).  Refrigerate and enjoy over the course of a week, or an hour.

Bean salad

Calorie Estimate: 600

Ingredients

• 2 cups of mixed beans
• 1/4 large red onion, diced
• 1 cup grape tomatoes
• 8 basil leaves, shredded
• 1 t olive oil
• a few T of raspberry vinegar
• salt and pepper to taste

Preparation

1. Make a salad.

Great lunch: chard and sausage over polenta

No one part of this meal was new to me, but the total came together fantastically.  I had one leftover cooked italian sausage, sliced thin, mixed into pan-wilted greens to crisp as the greens cook, served over polenta (minus the parmesan because I need to go cheese shopping, plus a little extra olive oil and Hungarian hot paprika (I’m American, I can get away with paprika in polenta!)), with a drizzle of excellent balsamic vinegar on top.  Healthy, beautiful to look at, and delicious.

Calorie Estimate: 700

That’s all, no prep stuff.  The recipes are in the links.  I just wanted to record the whole package before I forget it.

Vegetable Samosa Filling

Buy some puff pastry, wrap this as a filling, deep fry or bake with an egg wash, and you’ve got samosas.  One can imagine making the wrapping from scratch, but that proved to be beyond me, despite trying.  I’ll say nothing about the shame of using prepackaged “curry powder”.

Calorie Estimate: 650

Ingredients

• 1 baking potato, peeled and 1/2 cm dice
• 1 onion, 1/2 cm dice
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1.75 C frozen peas and carrot mix
• 1 T olive/vegetable oil
• 2 T off-the-shelf curry powder
• 1/2 C vegetable broth
• salt to taste (1/4-1/3 t kosher)
• adjust with cumin (1-2 t) and coriander (1/2-1 t)
• 1/2 t ground hot pepper of your choosing

Preparation

1. Prep the vegetables.  In a nonstick pan/pot with a lid, cook the onions and garlic over medium-high heat until they brown a little and soften.
2. Add in the peas, carrots, and potatoes.  Pour in the broth, add the curry powder, and simmer covered for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.
3. Depending on your curry expertise (or lack thereof), you’ll need to adjust the seasoning during the cooking.  After about 15 minutes, my old Trader Joes curry mix needed some help, so I added salt, cumin, coriander, and ground hot pepper to perk it up.

Bean and Feta salad

Calorie Estimate: 800

Ingredients

• 1 can mixed beans, rinsed and drained
• 1 1/4 cup crumbled feta
• 1 bunch green onions, sliced
• juice of half a lemon
• lots of black pepper to taste

Preparation

1. Mix everything together and enjoy.  Season as you like.  I’m sure I’ll get better at this as it goes.