Keys-Style Citrus Chicken.

Hubby and I made this last week, (yes, I'm a bit behind) and loved it.  We did find the recipe needed one addition though.  Drizzled honey over the plated dish makes it perfect.  I'm not sure how "Keys style" adding the honey is, but it's so needed. This recipe is from the Better Homes and Gardens Easy Everyday Cooking.

Keys-Style Citrus Chicken

4 medium skinless, boneless chicken breast halves (about 1 lb. total)

2 or 3 cloves garlic, peeled and thinly sliced

1 T. butter or margarine

1 t. finely shredded lime peel

2 T. lime juice

1/4 t. ground ginger

1/8 t. crushed red pepper

1 orange

Hot Cooked Rice (optional)

LIme Wedges (optional)

Honey (optional)

1. Rinse chicken; pat dry with paper towels.  In a large skillet cook chicken and garlic in butter or margarine over medium heat for 8 to 10 minutes or until chicken is tender and no longer pink, turning chicken once and stirring garlic occasionally.

2. Meanwhile, in a small bowl combine lime peel, lime juice,  ginger, and red pepper; set aside.  Peel orange.  Reserving juice, cut orange in half lengthwise, then cut crosswise into slices.  Add any reserved orange juice and the lime juice mixture to the skillet.

3. Place the orange slices on top of chicken.  Cover and cook for 1 to 2 minutes more or until heated through.

4. To serve, spoon any reserved drippings over chicken.  If desired, serve with cooked rice and garnish with lime wedges.  Makes 4 servings.

Ok, here's my advice.  As with any recipe, you must prep everything before you cook.  With this recipe, it's especially necessary.  Do step 2 first, and you will be much happier when it comes to actually cooking. (8 to 10 minutes for the chicken goes extremely quick!) Especially be sure that you have your orange prepared, as this seems to take the longest of anything.  And be free with the honey.  You'll love it.

Yogurt Cream & Berries, Cuban Coffee Chili, Steak Soup and Pumpernickel Bread.

So, this week Hubby and I have made many wonderful things...and I've been putting off posting about them.  For no good reason really, except that I had other things come up to keep my attention.   In any case, I'm back now, with yummy food to share.

First, we have Yogurt Cream and Berries. We had it both with blueberries and strawberries, myself finding strawberries to be infinitely the better choice.  It's meant for breakfast, but we had it for dessert after dinner as well.

Next, there is Cuban-Coffee Chili.  This is one is a specialty of Hubby's and mine.  We love taking it to church chili cook-offs.  People are wary because of the name, and because it has raisins in it, but believe me, you have to make it, the smell of it alone, will make you salivate.  

ingredients:

1 1/2 lb lean ground beef

2 med onions, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

2 bay leaves

2 t chili powder

1 t ground cumin

1/2 t nutmeg

1/4 t fresh ground black pepper

1/4 t ground allspice

1 t salt

1/4 t fresh chopped thyme leaves

1 T dark molasses

14 1/2 oz can diced tomatoes

1/3 cup raisins

1/2 cup toasted slivered almonds

5 cups hot cooked rice

1 t capers

2 T chopped pimiento-stuffed green olives

9 oz can (2 cans) diced green chiles

2 cups strong coffee

Directions:

1. Brown the meat and vegetables: In a large Dutch oven, brown the beef over medium-high heat -- about 3 minutes. Remove contents from the Dutch oven and set aside. Reduce heat to medium low. Add onions and saute until translucent -- about 3 minutes. Add garlic and cook 1 minute.

2. Make the chili: Replace meat and add bay leaves, chili powder, cumin, nutmeg, pepper, allspice, salt, thyme, capers, olives, chiles, coffee, molasses, and tomatoes. Simmer uncovered for 20 minutes.

3. Finish the chili: Add raisins and simmer uncovered for 10 minutes. Garnish with almonds. Serve hot over cooked rice.

The day after, we made Steak Soup for lunch.  Much better than I thought it would be, considering that I'm not a fan of minute steak. We'll definitely make it again. (Sorry, neglected to take pictures for this one.) Here's the recipe.

Ingredients:

2 4-oz. beef cubed steaks (also called minute steaks)

1/4 t. garlic salt

1/8 t. pepper

1 T. cooking oil

1 med. onion, chopped

1 stalk celery, chopped

4 cups water

1 10 oz. package frozen mixed vegetables

1 T. instant beef bouillon granules

1 T. Worcestershire sauce (We left this out, Hubby is allergic)

1 t. dried basil, crushed

1 7 1/2 oz. can tomatoes, cut up

1/2 c. cold water

1/3 c. all-purpose flour

Directions:

1. Sprinkle meat with garlic salt and pepper.  In a large saucepan, cook meat in hot oil over medium-high heat ablut 3 minutes or until brown, turning once.  Remove meat from saucepan, reserving drippings in pan.  Cut meat into cubes, set aside.

2. In the same saucepan, cook onion and celery in the reserved drippings over medium heat until tender.  Stir in meat cubes, the 4 cups water, the vegetables, bouillon, Worcestershire sauce, and basil.

3. Bring to boiling, reduce heat.  Cover and simmer about 5 minutes or until vegetables are crisp-tender.  Stir in undrained tomatoes.

4. In a screw-top jar shake together the 1/2 cup water and flour; stir into meat mixture.  Cook and stir until thickened and bubbly.  Cook and stir for 1 minute more.  Makes 5 servings. 

Tonight we made homemade pizza for dinner.  We'll post a step-by-step of this another time...it's a staple in this house, so it'll be around again soon, don't worry.  (Sorry, no picture...we were too hungry to stop and photograph.) 

Finally, I'm currently making Pumpernickel Bread. The end result of the loaves is actually croutons.  We recently tried Ruby Tuesday's croutons, and I'm now trying to simulate them.  If you have the opportunity, check out their salad bar...it's probably one of the best salad bars I've been to! Delicious!!!

Also, Hubby is wonderful.  He made me oatmeal for breakfast one morning, after a particularly difficult and sleepless night with our son.  It had apples chopped up and cooked in it, with pumpkin spice and nutmeg and cinnamon.  Yum!

Butter-Sugar Crepes.

Hubby and I made this recipe for brunch. It would have been for breakfast, but I forgot about the 1/2 hour chill time. Oh well. They were delicious! We topped them with whipped cream and enjoyed them while watching The Office.

P.S. This recipe came from the new software I mentioned yesterday. It's like having a whole new cookbook!

Butter-Sugar Crepes

Ingredients

7 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled, divided
1 cup whole milk
1 cup all-purpose flour
2 large eggs
6 tablespoons sugar, divided

Directions

Reserve 1 tablespoon melted butter for brushing skillet.

Blend milk, flour, eggs, 2 tablespoons sugar, 2 tablespoons butter, and 1/4 teaspoon salt in a blender until smooth, then chill, covered, 30 minutes.

Lightly brush a 10-inch nonstick skillet with some of reserved butter and heat over medium heat until hot. Pour in 1/4 cup batter, immediately tilting and rotating skillet to coat bottom, and cook crêpe, turning once, until just set and golden, about 1 minute total. Transfer to a plate. Make 7 more crêpes, stacking them.

Brush each crêpe with 1 teaspoon butter and sprinkle with 1 teaspoon sugar, then fold twice to form a triangle.

Heat 2 teaspoons each of butter and sugar with a pinch of salt in skillet until sugar has dissolved, then cook 4 crêpes, turning once, until golden brown. Repeat with remaining butter, sugar, and crêpes. 

Kabobs and a "Bento Lunch".

Ok, so here's lunch for Hubby and me.  We actually had fruit, salads, and juice! (Ok, the juice wasn't that great...it was Crystal Light, which uses fake sugar.  Blech!)  Hubby tried out his new bottle of buffalo sauce, which oddly had some cheese mixed into it, so it was a bit thick, but he dubbed it passable and now has a bottle to keep at home.

For dinner tonight we had kabobs.  There was no glaze, rub, or sauce, just straight chicken, red pepper, onion and apple.  The apple was a last minute decision, but it completely made the meal. (In my opinion.)  We had wild rice on the side, and my only complaint was that there wasn't more of it.  Delicious, easy meal! Everyone that can, go make yourself some kabobs before winter hits! (We all know that South Dakota becomes a frozen wasteland for at least five months of the year, so you had better hurry! Lucky us, here in Nebraska, only get four months of ice.)

On another note, Hubby found some great software for recipe management that I've just downloaded the trial version of.  I'm now off to play with it for the rest of the evening!

Pierogis.

One of the foods my husband introduced me to, back when we first started dating, was the pierogi.  (My mom probably had made them at some point, but I just don't recall.)  My first memory of them was being over at a mutual friend's home, and his dad making them for all of us.  I was so disappointed to only get three!  They were large, and very filling, but so good I just wanted more.  Since then, we've bought the frozen variety at wal-mart, and have been satisfied, but when I came across this recipe for Quick Potato Pierogis, I knew we had to try it.  We varied it slightly, and will change it more in the future, but as for now, here's how it goes together.

Ingredients:

1 1/2 pounds baking potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks (we used about 2 pounds)
4 to 5 tablespoons unsalted butter + a little extra to melt and drizzle over the dumplings
3 onions, finely chopped (food processors are great for this, or else it takes forever)
Salt and black pepper to taste
1 to 2 packages of gyoza (pot sticker) wrappers (we didn't even use a full package, but it had 60 wrappers in it)
3 to 5 green onions, thinly sliced or 1/4 cup chopped chives or 2 tablespoons chopped parsley or additional fried onions, to serve (we did butter and parsley)

Directions:

Put a pot of salt water on to boil, and prepare your potatoes while it heats. 

When the potatoes are tender, (stick a fork in one, and if it goes in very easily, it's ready), strain the water out and set aside.

Chop your onions while the potatoes are boiling.  You can either mince them by hand, or employ the use of a food processor.

When the onions are all minced, melt the butter in a large saucepan.  Once it is completely melted, add the onions and sauté until they are tender and begin to turn brown. 

Once the onions are sautéed to your liking, pour them, butter and all, into a mixing bowl with the potatoes.  Mash them all together, and season with salt and pepper.  Hubby and I decided to add a bit of cheese in as well. (The last of what we had in the fridge, a bit of shredded Co-Jack, and a bit of shredded Mozzerella.)

You are now ready to start filling your wrappers.

Give yourself a generous supply of water to help with this process.  Normally at this point you'd take a cookie cutter or something along those lines to cut the wrappers into nice circular shapes.  Unfortunately, my cookie cutters are still lost with the mysterious missing kitchen box, the only box we lost in our move at the beginning of summer.  Suffice it to say, Hubby and I made geometrically-shaped pierogis. 

Dip your finger in the water and run it along the outer edge of the wrapper. Spoon some of your filling onto the center of the wrapper.  Be careful not to put too much!

You'll figure out the perfect amount, but it is best to err on the side of too little filling, as too much keeps the pierogi from sealing completely.

Fold the corners, (or edges, if you cut yours into a circle) together. Press your finger firmly along the edges, to seal it.  Try to expel any air that you can from the inside as you do this.

Your pierogi is complete!  Rinse, repeat, until all filling is used up.

Once the pierogis are complete, you can either freeze them for later use, refrigerate them for later that day, or you can cook them immediately.  If you're going to freeze them, do so in a single layer, as if you do not, they will form a giant frozen ball of pierogi.  

If you want to cook them, you can either boil them in a single layer in a pot of boiling salt water for 2-3 minutes per batch, or you can sauté them in butter (still single layer batches,) until they begin to brown, then add 1/4-1/2 in. of water in the pan, cover, and cook for 3-4 minutes. When the water evaporates, the pierogis are tender and not mushy, they are done.

When they are cooked, you can garnish with what you will. (See above ingredient list.)  We chose to garnish ours with melted butter and parsley. MMMMM!