Chicken Madeira... Sort of

Hey there foodies. Yes, I just used that word. Anywho...

This past weekend I got to go home which was awesome. I was stoked not only to see my family, but because I was going to be able to cook for my parents. My kitchen back home isn't huge, but it's definitely better than the rabbit hole I cook in at school.

I found this recipe about a month ago. I've been salivating over it for weeks, but I told myself I wouldn't try it until I was home. The original recipe calls for Madeira wine, which I discovered at my favorite steakhouse, but my local grocery store didn't have it. I substituted a Chianti with excellent results. Though I loathe her, Ina Garten makes a good point: "Never cook with wine you wouldn't drink." I would definitely drink a Chianti, so I think it's definitely something I'll be cooking with in the future.

Chicken Maderia

Ingredients

• 5 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/2 shallot (you could use more, but my father isn't huge on shallots)
• 4 baby portobello mushrooms, thinly chopped (you can add more mushrooms if you like, but I dislike mushrooms a lot)
• About a teaspoon of salt
• 2 tbsp of heavy cream
• 2 tbsp of butter
• 1 1/2 cup of Madeira wine (again, I substituted a Chianti with delicious results)
• 1 tbsp of flour
• 3 cups cooked penne rigate
• 3 thin chicken breasts

Directions

First off, I apologize for not having any photos. I left my camera at school so I had no way to document this culinary triumph. I'll make it again another time and update.

For now, start by heating up a frying pan to medium heat. Add enough olive oil to coat the pan, but we don't want an ocean or anything.

While your pan is heating up, start cooking your pasta. Follow the instructions on the package. If they have an 'al dente' time, follow that. The heat from the sauce and chicken will finish up the pasta once we combine everything at the end. DO NOT forget to salt your water. It's one of the few sins that you can commit in cooking, in my opinion.

Season BOTH sides of your chicken breasts with salt and pepper, then place then in the pan. They should take about 4-5 minutes on each side. They should brown up nicely and smell pretty good. Once they're cooked, remove the pan from the heat and set the chicken on a plate.

In a second pan, start sauteing your garlic and the shallots in one tablespoon of the butter. You want them to start sweating, but you don't want to brown them, so about a minute or two should be good.

Add your mushrooms. Again, my family isn't big on cooked mushrooms so I didn't add very many. However, you can add as many as you like. Traditionally, this has a combination of baby portobellos and shitakes.

Let the mushrooms mixture cook until the mushrooms start to reduce and turn brown. The little bits will start sticking to the bottom. This is good.

Add the wine SLOWLY to the pan. Now, originally I was only supposed to add a cup of wine. I like wine. The cup quickly become a cup and a half, which I'm not ashamed of. Throw in the second tablespoon of butter. If it happens to be a bit more, no worries. It just makes the sauce more succulent, so no harm done. Let the wine simmer with the mushrooms, stirring occasionally until the wine reduces, roughly 20-25 minutes.

While your sauce is cooking, let's cut up our chicken. I took it and diced it into small, bite-sized pieces. You are more than welcome to slice it into strips, however I like getting a bit of chicken with every bite.

Once the wine is reduced, add in the heavy cream, salt and pepper. Simmer this for about 5 minutes.

The next step is a bit tricky, mostly because it depends on personal preference. SLOWLY stir in your flour a little bit at a time. The amount of flour you add will dictate how thick your sauce becomes. Personally, I like thicker sauces so it sticks to the pasta. I also like the thicker sauce because that allows me to add in the next step, which is COMPLETELY optional.

If your sauce becomes too thick, either by accident or personal preference, you can add in more wine, bit by bit. I like a thick sauce, but pasta doesn't combine well with paste... Now this does result in a bit harsher flavor, but my family and I didn't mind in the least.

Let the sauce cook for a further minute, while stirring constantly. We don't want the sauce to burn or remain stagnant. Once your sauce is done, remove from the heat.

Now, your pasta should have finished somewhere while you were letting your wine simmer. Once it's drained, throw it back into the pot you cooked it in. Add your cut chicken to the cause, stir a few times, then add the sauce to the pasta. Toss to coat.

Done! I personally serve this with warm, thick-cut sourdough with lots of butter. The bread makes an excellent mop for the leftover sauce on your plate or bowl or whatever you serve this in. Really it just gives me an excuse to eat bread and butter and some more wine. 

Infused Salt, First Attempt

Why hello there. Bas here, writing to you 2:05 Friday morning. Why am I up, you ask? That's a good question. I promise you, all will be answered throughout the following recipe.

Now, I need to make something clear here. Rose and I both love salt. LOVE it. We put it on pretty much everything, even if it already has salt in it. We both believe that salt enhances pretty much every recipe, sweet, salty, savoury, whatever. As she stated in her previous post, Rose even uses it in baking. WHAT?! I know, right? It's okay. Her baking is exquisite. Follow her example, trust me. Anyway, on to the the recipe.

I was inspired to try infusing salt while watching one of my favorite shows, Chopped on Food Network. One of the competitors made a rose salt by drying and pulverizing rose petals. This intrigued me, so I did some research on infusing salts. The process seems pretty easy: Find some ingredients that contain some type of oil, mix them with Sea or Kosher salt, allow them to 'ferment'  or smoke on a grill and voila.

Right. I'm a college student. I have very limited supplies, let alone access to a high quality grill or smoker. I also don't have a fully stocked kitchen like they usually do on TV. So here is my improvised, super simple, experimental version of an infused salt.

Garlic Rosemary Salt

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup table salt (really you should use sea or kosher salt, but I didn't have either on hand, nor was I about to walk to Safeway at 2 in the morning)
• 3 sprigs fresh Rosemary 
• 1 clove garlic

Directions

Start by prepping the rosemary. Rose and I had access to a Farmer's market a few weekends ago, so I had a bunch of fresh, organic rosemary. I could go all Ina Garten and blather on about organic, local ingredients. I envy the fact that she has access to those kinds of ingredients. I really do. I love them when I have them, but let's face it: most of the time, store bought, mass produced produce is easier to come by. Use organic if you can, but I'm not gonna judge you. Promise.

Pull the sprigs off the rosemary and discard the stalks.

Use the the end of a rolling pin to bruise the leaves. I happen to have a French Rolling Pin, the best kind to use, lying around my kitchen. Yes, I'm a kitchen tool snob. Get used to it. Anyway...

Pour your salt into a shallow container that has a lid. Layer the crushed rosemary on top of the salt.

Next for the garlic. I love garlic. So does Rose. See why we're friends... One of my favorite things about cooking with garlic is that you get to smash it before you chop it.

See? Now here's why my garlic looks so pitiful: Remember how I told you it's 2:05am? Yeah, well, I was supposed to go on a date tonight. Guess who got stood up? Hence the level of anger that went into the garlic. I know people say cooking is all about love, but I find that anger yields some pretty good results too.

Roughly chop the garlic. We don't want minced here, as you want to be able to remove it later on. Now my garlic is extremely wet. Again, I'm using some high quality local, organic garlic. Store bought is more than fine. Seriously.

Throw the garlic in with the rosemary and salt, then give it a few tosses. You want the salt to coat everything and get in between all the herbs and garlic.

Tightly cover with a lid and store in your cabinet. I'm going to leave this sitting for a day or two, then sift the salt out. I'll get back to you in a few days with the results. Let's pray I didn't just inadvertently create my own version of cyanide...

Cheers!

Rosemary's Own: Lemony Snicket Bars

Rosemary here, I want to apologize for the lack of pictures thus far. Neither I nor Bas has a functioning camera right now, but we will re-make and post eventually. Anyway:

So, a while back I purchased a jar of lemon curd at the local Celtic Festival. Generally when I have vast amounts of amazing, homemade lemon curd at my disposal I put into my shortbread recipe. Which, I will post and you will thank me for. It's that good. But, I had quite the biting for something tart so I thought I'd make a recipe for you guys!

It turned out pretty well if I do say so myself. I can't take full credit for the recipe though, it's a fairly basic lemon bar recipe with my own personal twists.
Anyway, I hope you like it! Oh, and don't forget to comment, I'd like to know if I'm an epic failure or not.

Lemony Snicket Bars

 

Theoretically, around 40 Servings. In theory. 

 

Warning: This recipe is only for those who love lemon. It’s more than a bit tart. So much so that I decided it needed two crusts rather than a typical sugar topping. 

 

Ingredients

• 1 Cup Unsalted Butter (You can use salted, I always do, which is a baking sin.)
• 2 Cups All-Purpose  or Pastry Flour (Which is much better if you have it lying about)
• 1/2 teaspoon Almond Extract
• 1/2 teaspoon Vanilla Bean Paste (extract would work just as well.)
• 2 Tablespoons White Vinegar
• 1 Cup White Sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon Baking Soda
• 1 (10 ounce) Jar of Lemon Curd (A legit kind too, you are ingesting it after all) 
• 2/3 cup toasted and chopped Hazelnuts
• 1/2 cup toasted and chopped Almonds

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). 

Start with the nuts: Take your nuts and spread them out on a baking sheet. Pop them in the oven for about 5 minutes on each side.

Now, I use a food processor. I recommend just pulsing it until the nuts are in somewhat small pieces. Nothing too large to get stuck in your teeth or overwhelm your servings. 

In a large mixing bowl cream the butter. Add the flour, sugar, vinegar, vanilla bean paste, almond extract, and baking soda. Mix until the mixture forms coarse crumbs 

Pat 2/3 of the mixture into the bottom of one 9x13 inch baking pan. 

Bake at 375 degrees F (190 degrees C) for 10 minutes. Remove and let cool slightly. 

Lower oven temperature to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) whilst it cools. 

Spread the lemon curd over the baked layer. 

To the remaining 1/3 of crumb mixture add the hazelnuts and the almonds. Sprinkle over the top of the lemon curd. 

Bake bars for 25 minutes or until lightly browned. 

Et Voila! Enjoy!

French Onion Soup

Serves 2 Gluttonous People, Maybe One if You’re Ambitious.

4 medium white onions, sliced

1 clove garlic

2 tablespoon Black Cherry vinegar

3-4 C vegetable stock

Pinch of thyme

1 bay leaf

1 tbsp butter

1 tbsp salt

1 ½ teaspoon fresh rosemary

1 C Pinot Grigio

8 oz Gruyere, chopped or shredded

French bread, toasted

Start by peeling and then halving the onions. Slice the onions at an 1/8^th of an inch width. You don’t want them too thick. 

Put them in a 2 Quart Pot or whatever semi-deep pot or pan you have lying about. You’re going to combine all of the ingredients into so make sure it’s large enough. Drizzle a bit of olive oil over the onions, two tablespoons or so, just enough to coat them. Light up the stove to a medium-high heat. 

Once the onions have softened, add the vinegar. It can be whatever kind of vinegar you like, we prefer a bit of tart in our dishes, but you are more than welcome to go the original route and add two teaspoons of sugar.

Overall the onion process will take anywhere from 30-40 minutes. We usually leave them a bit longer because we try and get them just before they’ll char for a more rustic flavor. 

Add the chopped garlic and sauté it with onions until it is just browning.

Add the stock to the onions. We used vegetable stock because it’s a bit lighter and not as heavy as the traditional beef stock. We’ve used chicken as well, and it is just as delicious. We use the vegetable stock as a vegetarian alternative because we live in Flagstaff. Google the demographic.

As a side, we only use 3 Cups of stock because we like our soup a bit thicker, more like a stew. Add more stock as you see fit.

I wait about five minutes from adding the stock before adding the wine so the stock has time to invade the onions a bit.

Now, one cup of wine is quite a lot. But we love it and are borderline alcoholics. Again, it’s at your discretion. Really we add a bit more because we like having a faint taste of wine. I would say a normal person would add about a ½ Cup of wine. 

            We've been toying with the idea of using a red wine instead; perhaps next time. 

Add the herbs and the butter. You don’t need the butter, we just like it. Do not, I repeat, do NOT forget the salt.

Cover and simmer on low heat for 40 minutes.

About 20 minutes in, preheat the oven to 325 Degrees.

Go ahead and slice your bread into ¼ inch slices and spread them out on a baking sheet, drizzled with a bit of olive oil and toast it for about 8 minutes.

Generally we bake this in a casserole dish because we tend to be feeding several people. Plus you can fit more bread over a wider surface area! If you are going to follow suit, just toast the bread in that same dish so you can see how much will actually fit. Or you can go the traditional way and separate them into individual bowls. [This is a great time to make homemade croutons with the extra bread by the way!]

Once the soup has simmered for 40 minutes, divide it up into whatever bowls or dish you are going to bake/serve it in.

Place your toasted bread on the surface of the soup and scatter the cheese (grated, sliced, whatever).  It should be covering everything.  

Traditionally, you would use Swiss cheese. You are again, welcome to do that, but honestly, gruyere is on a whole other level. It’s salty and thick, and just delicious. Whatever you decide to use, make sure you don’t skimp. Buy a good, hard cheese from the fancy section at your local market. It’s the only way and definitely worth the splurge.

Put it in the oven until the cheese is melted and just browning.

Make sure to let it sit for at least five minutes so it can cool and thicken.

C’est tout! You are ready to gorge yourself. And trust us: you will.

Awkward Handshakes

It wouldn't be right to divulge our most prized recipes and embarrassing moments without giving a bit of background, now would it?


We respond to the names Basil and Rosemary, Bas and Rose for short. Of course those aren't our real names but since we're going to be posting our most cringe-worthy and mortifying moments for all to see, we thought leaving a bit of mystery would be in our best interests.

Bas and I have been friends for a couple of years now. After toiling away at the same high school, and now at the same university, we've come to find that along with shared interests in making fools of ourselves, complaining about the most mundane things, and being a little bit too socially awkward, we also have a shared passion for food.

We are by no means experts, nor will we ever claim to be. It's a bit disjointed and sometimes heated (ha. hahaha) in the kitchen when we don't agree (namely Bas follows recipes and I just throw stuff together). But, at the end of the day we end up with something. It can turn out good, sometimes amazing, but oftentimes destined for the rubbish bin.

One thing is for sure, we always finish wiping down the counters having learned a lesson or a new trick. Though, and perhaps even more important, we leave with a new memory to share and laugh on.
After all, at the end of the day, that's what food is really all about.