I’ve been making homemade chicken stock pretty much since I started cooking. In college, it was just an economical way to stretch a $5 rotiserrie chicken. The problem is, I never graduated from my original technique: take all of the meat off a rotisserie chicken and reserve for another use; toss chicken carcass into giant pot with a halved onion, a carrot or two, and a stalk of celery; fill giant pot with water; simmer for hours; strain and freeze. The result of that method is certainly broth, it’s just not that good. Cloudy, thinly flavored, and a little gray – it’s fine for adding to a stew or sauce but certainly not something I would sip on it’s own.

It wasn’t until I spent six weeks in Asia last winter that I discovered that good stocks and broths aren’t only the backbone of a soup or a sauce, but culinary achievements in and of themselves. Of course, I knew this before going to Asia – I consume enough food literature to know that a good broth should stand on its own, needing no other embellishment to be enjoyed. But I didn’t really internalize how good a broth could be until I’d experienced the dumpling soups in Hong Kong, which consisted of broth, dumplings, maybe a few noodles, and that was it. No veggies floating around in these soups, or creams to thicken them, or salty slices of kielbasa. Then we moved on to Japan and consumed ramen for basically every other meal. There, broth took on another dimension of deliciousness – although for ramen it’s not so much about clarity and purity as it is about richness and salt.

Since coming home, over a year ago now, I have been pouring my heart and soul into making a perfect homemade chicken stock. I know precisely what I want to achieve: a stock that’s golden, clear, richly flavored, with just enough fat to lightly coat your mouth after a spoonful. I’ve been doing lots of research, and experimenting, and taking detailed notes on each batch.

After a recent batch, which I always seem to be putting away boiling hot at 10pm on Sunday night, Trevor looked and me and said “I can’t believe you make stock every weekend.”

“Not every weekend,” I corrected him. “But often,” he said. “It’s not like you tried it once and said ‘yep, I’ve made stock.’ You’re more like a Russian grandmother: ‘on Sundays I make stock, to feed the family and use up the chickens'”

That’s pretty much the long and the short of it.

Despite Trevor’s teasing, I persevered, and after a year of testing, I think I have it down. I’ve learned a lot of lessons on the way, helped by the notes and trials of more experienced chefs. Serious Eats taught me to cut my vegetables into small pieces instead of throwing them into the pot in chunks. Vietnamese Home Cooking taught me to blanch and rinse the chicken before starting the stock itself and to keep it at a low simmer to prevent cloudiness. I learned through trial and error that a 50/50 mixture of chicken backs and drumsticks or legs makes for the best balance of flavor, body, and affordability.

As far as aromatics, in my opinion, it’s the more the merrier. I always use 5 core vegetables: onion, carrot, celery, garlic, and one hot chile pepper. Beyond that, I’ve experimented with rosemary, parsley stems, shiitake mushroom stems, ginger, lemongrass and leeks. I find that the flavor only gets richer and more interesting the more I add. I always salt the broth at the beginning, which some experts say is a no-no, but I think it makes a big difference in the final flavor. And I use about 1 1/2 pounds of chicken for every quart of stock I want.

How I ever got any flavor out of a skimpy, already roasted, 1 pound chicken carcass without any meat beats me, especially since I was drowning it in a giant stockpot of water. I suppose I’m just glad that now I know better! Do you have any tips for making great homemade chicken stock? Although I’ve come a long way, I’d love to hear them. I’ll keep the recipe below updated as I find new tricks, but a year’s worth of testing went into it so far, so I can vouch that it’s a very solid recipe.

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Perfect Homemade Chicken Stock

Makes 3 quarts of stock.

• 2 lb. chicken backs or carcasses
• 2 lb. chicken drumsticks or legs
• 5 quarts of water
• 2 onions, skins on, chopped into 1 inch pieces
• 3 carrots, chopped into 1 inch pieces
• 3 stalks of celery, rinsed well, chopped into 1 inch pieces
• 1 dried hot chile
• 6 cloves of garlic, cut in half
• 1 bunch of parsley stems
• Optional additions: handful of clean shiitake mushroom stems, 1 inch peeled and sliced fresh ginger, 2 sprigs rosemary, 2 tsp whole black peppercorns
• 1 TBS sea salt

1. Place the chicken parts in a large stockpot. Add cold water to the pot just to cover the chicken. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat and boil for 2-3 minutes – white foam should float to the top of the pot. Remove from the heat and drain the water out. Rinse the chicken with cold water two to three times, draining after each rinse. The goal is to get as much of the blood and foam out of the pot and off the chicken as you can.
2. After blanching and cleaning the chicken, add the 5 quarts of cold water to the pot with the chicken. Add the chopped onion, carrot, celery, hot chile, garlic, parsley stems, and sea salt to the pot. Bring to a simmer over medium-low heat. Keep the stock at a low simmer until it is golden and color and the liquid has reduce by about half. This should take 3-4 hours. If the stock reduces too quickly without turning golden, add another 2 cups of cold water. Keeping the stock at a low simmer instead of a boil will help prevent the stock from getting cloudy.
3. When you think the stock is done, taste it to see if you are happy with the flavor and body. If it is done, let the stock cool for about 20 minutes, before straining it through a fine-mesh strainer into a large bowl, mason jars, or other storage containers. I like to ladle the stock out of the pot through the strainer as it gives me more control. If you disturb the vegetables too much while ladling or straining the stock, it may become cloudy.
4. Refrigerate or freeze the stock and use as needed for soups and sauces. Use the refrigerated stock within 3 to 4 days.

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Tokyo was a whirlwind. First of all, its huge. It’s not the kind of city you can see in a few days, or even a week. Add to that the cultural barrier and Tokyo seemed almost impenetrable to me, much more so than the other places we visited in Japan. So during the three days we spent there, I felt like I just barely dipped my toe in to the water.

We did experience some if it. We saw the bright neon lights of Akihabara Electric Town, which was complete sensory overload – the electric, futuristic Tokyo of the movies. At the Tsukiji Fish Market, we watched the vendors portion the enormous tuna into slabs and peered into tanks of squid and scallops. Outside the market, Trevor ate the biggest oyster I’ve ever seen. We ate sushi of the highest quality, the only non-Japanese people sitting at the counter, pointing and arigato our only forms of communication. We spent hours in the train station, eating porky tonkotsu ramen and shopping in anime stores, a whole store for each character. In Ginza, we explored department stores with whole floors dedicated to high-end foods, sampling what we could afford. A friend living in Tokyo took us out for fresh bonito and sake. We went to a park where the rapeseed was blooming, rendering the whole field a gentle, glowing yellow.

And we went to an izakaya for dinner, one of our most memorable nights. If you ever go to Tokyo, find your way to an izakaya. Located under elevated train tracks and down alleyways, these smoke-filled, hole-in-the-wall taverns are an experience. Filled with rowdy Japanese businessmen still in their suits, sometimes they are little more than a collection of plastic crates and an open grill protected by heavy plastic sheeting. But the food they turn out – skewers of grilled yakitori, platters of light and airy tempura, bowls of udon noodles – is sublime.

Recently, hoping to warm up a cold wintry night, we partnered with La Crema to attempt to replicate our izakaya experience at home. On our menu: tsukune with egg yolk, miso-marinated pork skewers, and seasonal vegetable tempura with mushrooms, brussels sprouts, and sweet potato. We broke out the indoor grill pan, cracked a few bottles of La Crema Monterey Pinot Gris and Sonoma Coast Chardonnay, and settled in for a night of cooking, drinking, and noshing.

Tsukune, my favorite yakitori dish, is a lightly seasoned, grilled chicken meatball served with a salty sweet tare sauce and a raw egg yolk. The Miso Pork Skewers are an easy dish – a simple marinade, some pork tenderloin, and a few minutes on the grill are all you need. Tempura is a bit trickier to master, but well worth it for the crispy, golden brown vegetables that are a staple of Japanese-American restaurants. All together, they make a fine meal: a bite of tsukune, a few pieces of tempura sweet potato, a sip of crisp Pinot Gris. It’s a great way to warm up a January night at home while reminiscing about past travels.

All of the recipes can be found on the La Crema blog (Tsukune, Miso Pork Skewers, and Winter Vegetable Tempura). And if you’re looking for dessert, might I suggest these Matcha Cream Puffs? I’ve got more matcha desserts in the works, but these are a good starting point.

More from Japan:
Japan Travelogue Part One: Kyoto; Matcha Cream Puffs
Japan Travelogue Part Two: Ise; Ginger Chicken Miso Ramen

Disclosure: This post is sponsored by La Crema. All opinions are honest and my own.

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Can you believe there are only 2 more weeks until Thanksgiving? And you know that after that it will be a whirlwind four weeks until Christmas, New Year’s and then 2016 will be off and running. I don’t mean to diminish the last two months of the year, but it’s a season that’s both joyous and a little exhausting, making the end of the year fly by.

We still go to our parents’ houses for thanksgiving, so I’m usually benefiting from other people’s good cooking rather than contributing my own. This is perfectly fine with me, as I cook enough the rest of the year – being fed a delicious meal prepared by someone else is a nice treat. Still, there are a few thanksgiving dishes that I like to cook on their own, and this year I’m collaborating with Cambria Wines to bring you a lovely stuffing recipe, featuring rich duck confit and sweet apples. I have to admit, I love store-bought stuffing, but when a homemade version is studded with juicy duck and cider-sauteed apples and flecked with sage and thyme, it’s at least equal, if not greater than, the stuff that comes out of a box.

Since duck is a gamey meat, this stuffing pairs equally well with Cambria Pinot Noir or Chardonnay, which is perfect if you’re planning on giving your guests multiple wine options on Thanksgiving. For the test run, I went with Cambria Julia’s Vineyard Pinot Noir, since it was a cold and rainy night and I was craving a juicy glass of red.

Find the recipes for this Duck Confit and Apple Stuffing over on the Cambria Wines blog!

Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by Cambria Wines. All opinions are honest and my own.

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The Book: Like many people, I love Southern food, and I’m hard pressed to turn down an opportunity to get my hands on another Southern cookbook. So when author Matt Moore reached out to me about reviewing his new book, A Southern Gentleman’s Kitchen: Adventures in Cooking, Eating, and Living in the New South, I couldn’t say no. I think a good word to describe this book is friendly – you’ll find simple and accessible recipes, large format, colorful pictures on every page, and personal and candid stories from Matt introducing each recipe. The recipes here are Southern but not exclusively so; in fact, I found that this book reads like a greatest hits list of classic meat and potatoes American home cooking – meatloaf, bolognese, fajitas, skirt steak, roast chicken, pan-seared pork chops, and so on. There’s even a recipe that’s called “Meat’n’Potatoes.” For the most part, the recipes are simple and hearty, with the occasional more sophisticated exception (I’m looking at you, Roast Quail with Pomegranate Quinoa). With lots of beef, pork, cheese, and potatoes, odds are you are not going to be eating light if you’re cooking from this book – so don’t come looking for something other than satisfying soul food to share with family and friends.

The long and the short of it is, I think a lot of people will find this book very appealing, and the 60 glowing Amazon reviews seem to back me up on that one. The recipes are simple and unabashedly American, but with a twist here or there that will elevate the dishes enough to impress the home cook hoping to put a delicious and hearty dinner on the table. That said, I’m not sure this book will be getting much use from me – it’s just a little heavier, a little more meat-centric, and a little more traditional than the way I typically cook. Still, I can see it coming in handy when I need a quick solution for a weeknight dinner, or Trevor is tired of eating bowls of grains and greens and salmon, or when we just want something homey and comforting.

The Food: The recipe I made from this book – Callie’s White Bean Chicken Chili – is the kind of thing I should make more often (which perhaps contradicts my statement above about how much I will use this book…). It’s super fast to make, using ingredients that require almost zero prep – canned beans, rotisserie chicken, canned green chiles, and shredded Monterey Jack cheese. It’s a convenient way to cook – I almost felt like I was cheating somehow – and the result was decadent, satisfying, and quite flavorful. I only made a few tweaks to the recipe: first, I blended the soup after adding half the beans and before adding the chicken, to give it a nice creamy thickness, and second, I only used about two thirds of the one pound of cheese the recipe called for, and I still found it almost too cheesy. And I love cheese. The way I’ve written the recipe below reflects these changes. Definitely don’t skip the corn chips! They add some much needed texture to the chili.

Recipe Shortlist: Creole Popcorn – Fried Crawfish Tails; Fried Dill Pickles with Cayenne Sauce; Pulled Pork BBQ Nachos; Peach Caprese Salad; Baked Trout with Prosciutto and White Cheddar Grits; Blackened Catfish with Salsa Fresca; Bone-In Pork Chops and Sweet Heat Peaches; Pimiento Mac’n’Cheese; Chorizo Roasted Potatoes with Vidalia Onions; Cast Iron Skillet Jalapeno Cornbread; Grilled Georgia Peach Crumble

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Disclosure: I received a review copy of A Southern Gentleman’s Kitchen from author Matt Moore, but I was not otherwise compensated and all thought and opinions are my own.

Callie’s White Bean Chicken Chili

Adapted slightly from A Southern Gentleman’s Kitchen. Serves 6.

• 4 (15-oz) cans of Great Northern Beans
• 1 TBS olive oil
• 1 large sweet onion, finely diced
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• sea salt, to taste
• 1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
• 1/2 tsp ground cumin
• 1/4 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
• 2 (4-oz) cans of chopped green chiles
• 3 c. chicken broth
• Meat from 1 rotisserie chicken, removed from bird and cut into bite-sized pieces
• 2 c. (8 oz) shredded Monterey Jack cheese
• Blue corn chips, for topping

1. Drain and rinse three of the four cans of beans. Do not drain the fourth can.
2. Heat the olive oil in a large stockpot over medium heat. Add the onion and saute until translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic and saute until fragrant, about 2 minutes longer. Season the vegetables with sea salt, then add the black pepper, cumin, and red pepper flakes and continue to saute for 5 minutes, stirring frequently.
3. Add the green chiles, chicken broth, and 2 cans of the drained beans to the pan. Bring to a simmer, then remove from the heat. Transfer the soup to a blender and blend on high until smooth, then return to the pot and place back on the stove. Add the second two cans of beans and the chicken, bring to a simmer, and simmer for 10 minutes.
4. Remove the soup from the heat. Add the cheese and stir into the soup until it is melted. Serve the soup immediately, garnished with the corn chips.

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The Book: Although I know that for a lot of Americans, chicken is the mainstay of the family dinner table, I actually don’t cook it very often. My parents might find this ironic, as the only form of protein I consumed up to age 14 was basically chicken fingers. (And I suppose the occasional hot dog.) Perhaps the reason it doesn’t make it into my cart all that often is childhood overexposure, but more likely, it’s because I find chicken a little ho-hum. Diana Henry’s new book, A Bird in the Hand, is written for precisely that reason – to remind you of all the exciting, flavorful ways you can use that package of chicken sitting in the fridge. You know, that one you picked up because it was on sale and it seemed like a practical thing to buy.

I’m a huge fan of Diana Henry’s work. A Change of Appetite, one of her more recent books, is the book I’m cooking from the most these days, and Roast Figs Sugar Snow was one of the first cookbooks I purchased for myself. So despite my lack of enthusiasm for chicken in general, I was excited to see what magic Diana could work with the ubiquitous bird – I was not disappointed. She brings a great deal of variety – in flavor and technique – to the humble chicken. Recipes are divided into sections based loosely on how much effort they will need from you, ranging from simple suppers prepared in 15 minutes after a long day at work, to feast dishes meant to be the crowning glory of a celebratory table. There’s lots of international spin here, with inspiration coming from every corner of the globe. It’s evident just by looking at the “recipe shortlist” I’ve included below… almost every recipe on there has a distinct and easily identifiable global origin. Every part of the bird, too, is represented, although I will say that boneless, skinless thighs seem to be the favorite. And of course, the book is graced by the bright, inviting food photography and clean design I’ve come to expect from all of Diana’s books. Of all the books I’ve reviewed recently, this one is probably the safest bet for your average cook – the one that loves to eat and doesn’t mind dedicating a short amount of time to a great home-cooked dinner, but who doesn’t go in for complicated techniques or impossible to find ingredients.

The Food: I had a short but concentrated Eastern European food kick last weekend. Friday night I dragged Trevor out for beer and brats and pretzels dipped in super-spicy mustard at Bronwyn. Then, flipping through this book trying to decide what to make for lunch on Saturday, I went straight for the rye chicken schnitzel. The chicken recipe itself was fairly standard – pound the chicken thin; dip in flour, egg, and rye breadcrumbs; shallow fry and serve immediately – but turned out beautifully. The slightly decadent mustard cream sauce served with it was the perfect mix of rich and tangy. And Diana’s recommendations for side dishes of tiny boiled new potatoes and braised cabbage were essential elements for the final plate. With a frosty glass of Belgian beer it made for a very satisfying Saturday lunch… and an even more satisfying post-bar-hopping midnight snack that evening.

Recipe Shortlist:  Cumin and Turmeric Roast Chicken with Smashed Avocado and Corn Cakes; Thai Chicken Burgers with Asian Slaw; Puerto Rican Chicken and Rice; Chicken Forestiere; Jamaican Chicken Curry with Sweet Love Apples and Rum; Indonesian Roast Spiced Chicken with Mango and Tomato Salad; West African Chicken and Peanut Stew; Chicken Legs in Pinot Noir with Sour Cherries and Parsnip Puree; Chicken, Aspragus, Fava Bean, and Radish Salad with Dill and Mint Dressing; Chicken, Leek, and Hard Cider Pie with Sharp Cheddar and Hazelnut Crisp

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Disclaimer: I received a review copy of A Bird in the Hand from Mitchell Beazley, but I was not otherwise compensated and all thought and opinions are my own.

Rye Chicken Schnitzel with Mustard Sauce

Recipe from A Bird in the Hand. Serves 4.

• 8 skinless, boneless chicken thights
• flour
• sea salt and pepper
• 3 eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 3/4 c. rye bread crumbs
• 2 TBS peanut or canola oil
• 1/2 lemon
• 1 TBS butter
• 4 shallots, peeled and minced
• 3 1/2 TBS white wine vinegar
• 2/3 c. dry white wine
• 3/4 c. heavy cream
• 2 TBS Dijon mustard

1. Put the chicken thighs between 2 sheets of parchment paper or saran wrap and use a rolling pin or meat mallet to pound them until they have an even thickness of about 1/2 inch. Place some flour in a large shallow bowl and season liberally with salt and pepper. Place the beaten eggs in a second bowl, and the bread crumbs in a third bowl. Dredge the chicken first in the flour, then in the egg, then into the rye crumbs. Set them on a nonstick cookie sheet as they are ready.
2. Heat the peanut or canola oil in a large frying pan over medium heat. Let the oil heat up for at least 1 minute before adding the chicken. Add the chicken to the pan and cook for 4 minutes on each side, until the coating is golden brown and the chicken is fully cooked through (juices run clear when sliced in the center). Immediately upon removing from the heat, season with salt and pepper and a squeeze of lemon.
3. While you are frying the chicken, make the mustard sauce. In a medium pan, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the shallots and saute until soft, about 2-3 minutes. Add the vinegar, turn up the heat, and reduce the liquid to about 1 TBS. Add the white wine and simmer to reduce by half, then add the cream, mustard, and salt and pepper and heat through. Remove from the heat.
4. Serve the chicken immediately with the sauce on the side. Good accompaniments are braised red cabbage, pickles, and boiled new potatoes.

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I’m back in the US again (airport blog posts for the win!), which is mostly a good thing. The weather in Boston this weekend is supposed to be beautiful, my birthday festivities begin next week, and then there’s a long weekend before I head back to Colombia. The only downside? I have to finish doing my taxes. And ASAP. Since I run this blog as a business, my taxes are kind of a nightmare – freelance business owners with lots of small transactions and quick and easy taxes do not go hand in hand. I’m almost done (I think), but it’s not my favorite activity.

Like any unpleasant task, doing your taxes is made easier by scheduling in small rewards. Rewards like a bowl of ice cream, a glass of wine, or an episode of Scandal (if you’re me, at least). Or, if you need a bigger break, pressing pause on the taxes and cooking up some Southern-style comfort food. Having spent my formative college years in North Carolina, I have a soft spot in my heart for good Southern food, especially during times of stress (late night studying, frantically finishing a problem set before class… doing your taxes on the night of April 14th…). So, I’ve teamed up with Cambria Wines to create a Southern dinner that you can enjoy with a glass (or two) of their Katherine’s Vineyard Chardonnay.

Although perhaps not the most classic of Southern dishes, my “tax break” Southern comfort food dinner starts with a smoky chicken gumbo. Only, if you told a real Southerner that it was gumbo they would probably debate it with you, and they would be right to, since this recipe doesn’t take the time to make a deeply flavorful roux before starting the rest of the soup. So, let’s call it a “gumbo-style” smoky chicken stew. It’s full of smoky, rich, Southern flavors – smoked andouille sausage, smoked paprika coated chicken, sweet red peppers, and cayenne – and served over cheesy, smoked gouda grits for good measure. For dessert, there’s maple corn cake – sweeter and fluffier than a corn bread thanks to the use of corn flour and lots of maple syrup, but still simple and rustic in the best way. Topped with Chardonnay-poached peaches and freshly whipped cream, you won’t even remember why  you needed a break in the first place.

Find the recipes for the Smoky Chicken Gumbo with Cheesy Grits and Maple Corn Cake over on the Cambria Wines blog!

Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by Cambria Wines. All opinions are honest and my own.

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This Sunday Dinner post is a big one – I’m not even entirely sure where to start. There’s the obvious, of course, that it was for our Valentine’s Day celebration, so it had to be special and a little bit decadent. There’s the fact that we prepared it during a blizzard, the third big storm in what feels like a never-ending chain of snow and white skies and freezing temperatures – a winter so beyond our imaginations that our city is stuck somewhere between awe, deep frustration, and total apathy. There’s the coffee-crusted duck, the centerpiece of the meal, that we lifted from the menu at Bouchard in Newport, where we spent a wonderful evening last weekend, dining in quiet elegance before slipping back to a room with a fireplace and a four-poster bed, where I wanted to stay forever. There’s the champagne we popped last night, the leftovers of which we unexpectedly took to a blizzard brunch around the corner – because day-drinking and eating waffles is a pretty good way to spend a blizzard. There’s the chocolate espresso layer cake, which we ate thick slices of in bed this morning with our morning coffee, our windows completed whited out by the snow whirling outside. There’s the chanterelle bisque, made from chanterelles we foraged in the middle of the summer, a time so green and warm and damp that it seems like it happened in another lifetime. These recipes have so many bits and pieces of memories tucked inside them it’s hard to sort out a clear thread between them – and now of course they will bring back to us the Valentine’s Day Blizzard of 2015, another weekend spent together grateful for a quiet and warm house in which to hide away and dream of spring.

The menu we made for this dinner is wintery, earthy, and elegant all at the same time, with rich flavors tied one to the next: blood orange, endive, chanterelle, chestnut, coffee, brandy, chocolate. Brilliantly colored blood orange mimosas spiked with Campari and honey. A salad of bitter endive and radicchio topped with blood orange slices, goat gouda, and toasted hazelnuts. A velvety bisque of roasted chestnuts and chanterelles. A gorgeous duck breast, coated in coffee and drizzled with rich brandy-balsamic sauce. And a cake – two fat layers of chocolate cake spread thickly with chocolate-espresso buttercream. Everything turned out beautifully, and although there are certainly a lot of components, it was doable to prepare everything in one afternoon, and still sit down with enough energy to enjoy the meal and each other’s company.

The Menu
Blood Orange Mimosa
Endive and Blood Orange Salad
Chanterelle and Chestnut Bisque
Coffee-Crusted Duck Breast with Brandy-Balsamic Sauce
Chocolate Espresso Layer Cake

Past Sunday Dinners:

May 26, 2013: Coffee-and-Chile Rubbed Strip Steaks with Chimichurri Sauce; Charred and Smoky Belgian Endives; Oven-Roasted Potatoes; Strawberry-Sour Cream Ice Cream

July 1, 2013: Strawberry-Lime Agua Fresca; Smashed Pea, Dill, and Feta Crostini; Chilled Asparagus Soup with Meyer Lemon Yogurt; Mustard Spaetzle with Mushrooms; Ricotta Bavarese with Red-Wine Poached Rhubarb

October 28, 2013: Braised Lamb Shanks with Gremolata; Creamy Polenta with Fresh Corn and Blue Cheese; Roasted Brussels Sprouts; Classic Apple Pie

March 31, 2014: Fried Halloumi with Spring Veggies and Strawberry-Basil Gastrique; French Gnocchi with Watercress Sauce; Strawberry-Rhubarb Meringue Pots

August 31, 2014: Roasted Garlic, Ricotta, and Maple-Roasted Cherry Tomato Crostini; Eggplant and Pesto Napoleons; Maple Mixed-Berry Pie

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Blood Orange Mimosa

Serves 2.

• 1/2 c. freshly squeezed blood orange juice (from about 2 oranges)
• 1 1/2 oz. Campari
• 1 TBS honey
• chilled Prosecco or Champagne

1. Whisk together blood orange juice, Campari, and honey until honey is dissolved. Divide between two champagne flutes and top with prosecco or champagne. Stir gently with a long handled spoon or small whisk. Serve immediately.

Endive and Blood Orange Salad

Serves 4.

• 1 small head of radicchio
• 1 large Belgian endive
• 3 blood oranges
• 1/4 c. hazelnuts, chopped and lightly toasted in a dry pan
• 2 oz. thinly sliced goat gouda or other goat cheese
• 2 TBS champagne vinegar
• 1/4 c. olive oil
• sea salt and pepper to taste

1. Remove and discard the outer leaves from the radicchio and cut out the thick core at the bottom. Roughly chop or shred the radicchio and place in a bowl. Remove the outer leaves from the endive. Slice into thin rounds and add to the bowl with the radicchio. Toss the two vegetables together to evenly combine.
2. Peel the oranges. Juice one of the oranges so that you have 1/2 cup of juice. Slice or supreme the remaining 2 oranges and set aside.
3. Assemble the salads by dividing the radicchio mixture between four plates. Top each with several pieces of blood orange, a spoonful of the toasted hazelnuts, and a few slices of the goat gouda. To make the dressing, whisk together the blood orange juice, champagne vinegar and olive oil until well combined. Season to taste with salt and pepper and drizzle over the salads. Serve immediately.

Chanterelle and Chestnut Bisque

Serves 2-3.

• 2 TBS butter
• 1/3 c. finely diced onion
• 2 c. fresh chanterelles, cleaned and torn into bite-sized pieces
• sea salt and pepper to taste
• 1 c. peeled, roasted chestnut pieces
• 3 c. chicken stock
• 3 sprigs fresh thyme
• 1/2 c. heavy cream

1. Melt the butter in a large frying pan over medium heat. Add the onion and saute until translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the chanterelles and saute until soft and browned on the edges, about 8-10 minutes, stirring frequently. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Set several spoonfuls of the cooked chanterelles aside (for garnishing the soup).
2. Add the remaining chanterelles, chestnuts, chicken stock, and thyme to a soup pot and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Simmer for 10-15 minutes, then remove from the heat. Spoon out the thyme stems and discard. Transfer the soup to a blender and add the heavy cream. Blend on high until very smooth. Pour into bowls and garnish with the reserved chanterelles. Serve immediately.

Coffee-Crusted Duck with Brandy Balsamic Sauce

Inspired by dinner at Bouchard. Serves 2-3

• 2 medium duck breasts, trimmed of fat
• 4 TBS freshly ground coffee beans
• 2 TBS dark brown sugar
• 1 tsp sea salt
• 1 tsp freshly ground black pepper
• 3/4 tsp chili powder
• 3 TBS butter, divided
• 2 tsp flour
• 1/4 c. brandy
• 1 TBS balsamic vinegar
• 1/2 c. stout or other dark beer

1. Preheat the oven to 375°F. Mix the coffee, brown sugar, salt, pepper, and chili powder together in a small bowl. Rub the mixture all over the duck breasts so they are fully coated. Melt 2 TBS butter (or duck fat, if you’d like) in a dutch oven over medium-high heat. Place the duck breasts in the pan and sear for 1 minute on each side. Flip them a second time (to return to the original side) and transfer the pan to the preheated oven. Cook the breasts for 5-7 minutes, to at least an internal temperature of 130°F. Remove from the oven, transfer to a cutting board or plate and let rest for at least 5 minutes.
2. Scrape as much of the coffee grounds as you can out of the dutch oven and discard. Melt the remaining 1 TBS of butter in the dutch oven over medium heat. Add the flour and stir to make a paste, cooking for 60 seconds. Add the brandy to the pan (don’t stand over the pan as you do this, as the alcohol will evaporate rapidly and can make you quite dizzy), followed by the balsamic and the stout. Stir to make a thick sauce and cook for 2-3 minutes, until thick and syrupy. Remove from the heat. Slice the duck on the bias and serve drizzled with the brandy-balsamic sauce.

Chocolate Espresso Layer Cake

• 1 recipe of Add A Pinch’s “Best Chocolate Cake,” baked in three 6×2 inch pans for 35-40 minutes
• 1 recipe Chocolate-Espresso Flour Buttercream, recipe below

1. Once you have baked the three cake layers, turn out onto a cooling rack and let cool completely. Use a serrated knife to trim the dome from each cake so that you have flat layers. Frost the cooled cake with the buttercream, using a dot of buttercream on your cake plate to hold the cake steady. If the cake is crumbing too much as you frost, refrigerate the cake briefly before continuing to frost. Chill the frosted cake for at least 30 minutes before serving.

Chocolate-Espresso Flour Buttercream

Adapted from Serious Eats basic Flour Buttercream. Makes about 3 cups of frosting.

• 4 TBS flour
• 1 c. granulated sugar
• 2 tsp espresso powder
• 1 c. whole milk
• 2 oz. unsweetened chocolate, chopped into bite-sized pieces
• 2 sticks salted butter, softened to room temperature

1. Whisk the flour, sugar, and espresso powder together in a medium saucepan until smooth. Whisk in the milk, and place over medium heat. Bring the mixture to a low boil, whisking the entire time. As the mixture begins to boil it will thicken to a custard like consistency – still whisking, cook the custard for one minute, then remove from the heat. Add the chopped chocolate and whisk until melted. Continue whisking the custard until it has cooled to body temperature, about 5 minutes. Set aside.
2. In a large bowl, beat the softened butter until it is light and fluffy. If it is greasy, refrigerate for a few minutes to make it more firm. Add the cooled chocolate custard to the whipped butter one spoonful at a time, beating to thoroughly incorporate the custard into the butter between additions. If the frosting begins to break or separate, refrigerate for a few minutes before continuing to add the chocolate custard. Once all the custard has been incorporated into the butter, refrigerate the buttercream for 20-30 minutes before frosting your cake. If you refrigerate the buttercream for longer than 30 minutes, you will need to allow it to come back to slightly below room temperature before using.

The post Sunday Dinner: Valentine’s Day Edition // Chanterelle and Chestnut Bisque, Coffee-Crusted Duck Breast, and Chocolate Espresso Layer Cake appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

Another post brought to you from on the road, although this time it’s not exactly planned. Trevor and I spent the last 5 days on vacation in the USVI, for some much needed sun and unplugged time. I’m pretty sure it was not particularly high on Trevor’s all-time-best vacation list, given that he’s been battling a sinus/ear infection pretty much since we landed on the island, but it was still great to be outside and soak in the views, even if we took it a little slower than we might have otherwise. However, since we were supposed to fly back into Boston Monday night and Blizzard Juno (man, I really hate that they name snowstorms now) had other ideas, we are now on an unplanned, extended layover in Miami. It’s a little bit of a pricey layover… but things could be a lot worse. A) We aren’t stuck in Boston pining for a missed vacation and B) we’re on a beach while everyone at home is just listening to the wind howl and watching the snow pile up.

So I’m still mostly in vacation mode, but I am starting to think ahead to what needs to be taken care of when I get home, and what’s coming up in the next couple of weeks. And one of those things is the big game this weekend. I’m not really much of a sports fan, but over the past 5 or 6 years, I’ve watched my baby brother turn my parents into diehard Patriots fans, to the point where I’ll show up in the house on game day to find everyone dressed in jerseys and cheering loudly for individual players. It’s a bit incongruous with my memories of growing up – my dad always loved soccer, but baseball, football, and basketball were things we played outside, not watched on TV. I’m OK with it, though, because if there’s one thing I can appreciate about watching football, it’s the food that comes with it. Nachos, chili, wings, guacamole, and pizza – it’s like junk food heaven. Of course when my family is cooking, junk food tends to be not that junky – homemade pizza and chili with cornbread are a far cry from the greasy fryolator food we associate with huge crowds and stadiums.

These wings are another example of classic stadium finger food given a healthier and more refined twist. Marinated in an exciting, Korean-inspired sauce, then baked instead of fried, they’re a bit more gourmet than buffalo wings but equally delicious. The sauce is primarily a mixture of gochujang – a spicy Korean red pepper paste – and pomegranate molasses, which adds tang and depth of flavor in addition to sticky sweetness. A few other strong flavors: fresh ginger, honey, and umeboshi plum vinegar round out the intense sauce for a balanced, spicy-sweet chicken wing. Tossing the sticky wings in toasted sesame seeds and chopped cashews after baking gives them a bit more crunch, and adds another element of flavor. While beer is the obvious choice for football-watching, it’s not the only one. I’m personally much more of a wine-lover, and these wings go just as well (if not better) with a glass of light red as with a cold beer. If you’re also a wine-lover, the La Crema Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir is a great pairing for these. The pomegranate notes in both the wine and the wing sauce will complement one another, and the Pinot Noir’s relatively light body makes it a good choice for serving with spicy food.

Find the recipe for these wings over on the La Crema blog!

Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by La Crema. All opinions are honest and my own.

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The post La Crema Game Day: Korean Gochujang Wings appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

The Book: In some ways, blogger Mimi Thorisson’s life is incredibly frustrating to observe from afar – a country house in France, seven beautiful children, days spent foraging for mushrooms in the woods or shopping at open air markets and then cooking veritable feasts in a giant old kitchen. Add to that a chateau to be renovated as an inn and restaurant, a TV show, a lovely new cookbook, and you would think that more people would envy her to the point of hatred – but I think it must be impossible to hate Mimi, whose writing and stories clearly show that she is a smart, loving woman who has worked quite hard to be where she is. All this is a long-winded way of saying that when I opened her new book, A Kitchen in France, it was not with jealousy but with joy at her success and excitement at discovering more lovely little glimpses into her countryside life.

The book is very much an extension of the blog, with the same look and feel and type of food (although I do wish that more of Mimi’s thoughtful long-form prose would have made it into the book). All her recipes and stories have a bit of a fairytale aura about them: long treks through the woods, basket on her arm, searching for cepes and late nights around old wooden tables with winemakers discussing the day’s harvest. You will find some recipe repeats from her blog, but the newly included dishes are more than enough reason to pick up a copy. I would love to have Mimi cook for me one day – she cooks big, unapologetic meals that celebrate flavor and richness and decadence. They are not meals for a single person or a quick workday lunch eaten at your desk, they are meals that are meant to be shared with family, friends, and strangers, meals that are meant to be cooked slowly and lingered over at the table. Even her “summer” dishes have a wonderfully cozy, homey feel to them – dishes like duck breasts grilled over grape vines and the mustard-roasted poussins featured here. It makes me think that Médoc must be a little bit like Maine, where a warm and hearty dinner at the end of a long day spent outdoors feels appropriate no matter what the season. It’s a particularly good book to have on hand as we head into the holiday season, when the focus on eating and sharing good food is strongest. And I very much agree with Mimi’s representation of “good” food. Her recipes are refreshingly free of modern food and health classifications – no gluten-free, vegan, or low-fat designations to be found. And yet, every recipe feels wholesome and nourishing, simply because it is made from ingredients found just down the road, or in the woods, and cooked lovingly at home. Mimi’s food – and this book – is all about flavor, nourishment, and gathering around the table, as it should be.

The Food: Something about the luxurious presentation of Mimi’s food had me imagining that it would be fairly complicated to prepare. But as I flipped through the recipes trying to choose one for this post, I realized that most of the recipes are actually quite simple – I could cook many of them without even making a trip to the grocery store. This recipe for mustard-roasted poussins is no exception, as the only additions I made to my list were creme fraiche and the chicken itself.

I have a confession to make at this point: this was the first time I’ve ever roasted a chicken. I know. Five years as a food blogger, making things like rabbit pie and homemade parathas and venison ragu, but I’ve never done a simple roast chicken. We did roast a duck last year as part of the Captain Morgan challenge, but I think Trevor did most of the duck handling while I focused on the stuffing. To be honest, I still get a little squeamish working with big pieces of meat. I don’t know if it comes from my long past vegetarian childhood or just being out of my comfort zone. With a bit of guidance from Mimi, however, I turned out a succulent chicken, flavored with a generous amount of mustard and creme fraiche, a handful of baby potatoes tucked neatly underneath to catch the goodness of the drippings. Although it only took 15 minutes of effort to prepare, lifting the lid to reveal the chicken to Trevor was quite satisfying, in a very domestic way. The reward to effort ratio on this recipe is high, making it an easy decision to add it to our dinner rotation.

Recipe Shortlist: Fava Bean Soup with Pancetta and Croutons; Langoustines with Armagnac; Pistachio Sabayon with Strawberries and Meringues; Squab Pie with Foie Gras and Armagnac; Pork Cheek Ravioli with Cepes; Calvados and Creme Fraiche Apple Tart; Roquefort and Walnut Gougeres; Roasted Sausages with Red Wine and Fennel; Butternut Squash Gratin; Oxtail-Macaroni Gratin

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Disclaimer: I received a review copy of A Kitchen in France from Clarkson Potter, but I was not otherwise compensated and all thought and opinions are my own.

Mustard Roasted Poussins

Recipe from A Kitchen in France. Serves 4.

Note: Poussins as small as 1 1/2 pounds can be tricky to find in the US. We used a young, Kosher chicken that was 3 pounds with great results. A 3-pound chicken provided a generous meal for 2 of us.

• 1/2 cup Dijon mustard
• 1/4 c. creme fraiche
• 4 TBS unsalted butter, at room temperature
• juice of 1/2 lemon
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
• Four 1 1/2 pound poussins or guinea hens
• Fine sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
• Olive oil for drizzling
• 2 lbs. small new potatoes, scrubbed and halved

1. In a medium bowl, combine the mustard, creme fraiche, butter, lemon, garlic, and nutmeg and mix until thoroughly combined. Wash the poussins (chickens) inside and out and pat dry. Rub the mustard mixture on the chickens inside and out, then season generously with salt and pepper. Place in a dish or bowl and let marinate for at least 2 hours or overnight.
2. When you are ready to cook the chicken, preheat the oven to 350°F. Put the halved new potatoes in a saucepan, cover with cold water, season generously with salt, and bring to a boil over medium heat. Reduce the heat and simmer for 10 minutes, until potatoes are partially tender but still hold their shape firmly. Drain the potatoes.
3. Put the poussins in individual baking dishes or one large roasting pan. Scatter the potatoes around the poussins, then drizzle everything with olive oil. Roast until the poussins are golden and cooked through (the juices should run clear, not pink, when pricked with a knife, and the internal temperature of the thickest part of the thigh and breast should be greater than 165°F). If the birds are getting too dark, cover with foil.
4. Serve 1 poussin per chicken with a side of potatoes.

The post Book Club: A Kitchen in France // Mustard-Roasted Poussins appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

I totally spaced on October’s fitness goal. I didn’t have a particularly bad month, health-wise, it was just such a whirlwind that setting a new goal, sticking to it, and writing about it just didn’t happen. It didn’t help that I spent 12 days out of the country, 8 in Malaysia and 4 in Ireland, and that exercise while traveling is usually a take-what-you-can-get situation for me (20 minutes on the treadmill between meetings and team dinner? Sold!). But so far November looks quiet, and as we move into the season of holiday parties, big family meals, and shorter, colder, darker days, I want to be especially diligent about working out and eating right and finish the year out strong.

I was originally going to do a sort-of-vague, sort-of-boring goal relating to increasing my number of weekly workouts. I do want to be sure that I’m working out frequently enough, as it’s so much harder to motivate myself to get out of bed for those early morning runs when it’s 40°, but I’m not as good as sticking to goals when they don’t excite me. Then last weekend while Trevor was out with friends, I found myself having one of those sort-of-secret mini-dance parties I tend to have when I’m home alone (just me? no?) and thought, what better way to ensure that I get into the habit of winter workouts than to dance more? So my goal for November is to get to at least 6 (hopefully more!) dance classes throughout the month. Not only is this goal a lot more fun than counting miles or sets of crunches, but I’m hoping that I find a few new classes to keep me energized during those icy weeks when outdoor exercise isn’t even an option. Of course, I’ll still be running throughout the month – 6 workouts in total certainly wouldn’t cut it – but I’ll be making dance class a priority.

And let’s not forget the food! My diet these past few weeks has definitely been missing a fresh element. Again, the 8 days of delicious Malaysian curries and 4 days of potatoes and Guinness did not lend themselves to the most commendable eating habits. I came up with this rice bowl, which combines warm, comforting ingredients with fresh, bright ones to try and find a balance between the stick-to-your-ribs food I crave at this time of year and the need to continue consuming fruits and vegetables. I love roasted Brussels sprouts, and my favorite part are the leaves that fall to the side and get wonderfully crunchy and caramelized, so I sliced the brussels sprouts thinly to encourage that effect. They combine wonderfully with the brown rice, a super simple lemon creme fraiche sauce that gets tossed with rotisserie chicken, and fresh pomegranate seeds for sweetness and crunch. It’s nothing earth-shattering in the creativity department, but it’s easy, flavorful, and nourishing, which is about as much as I can ask for in a healthy recipe at this time of year.

Past Fitness Challenges

January: 10 Visits to the YMCA; Recipe: Gluten-Free Olive-and-Feta Corn Muffins
February: One vegan meal every day; Recipe: Pakistani Chickpea Pulao with Sweet-Hot Date-Onion Chutney
March: Run 40  miles in 20 days; Recipe: Chocolate-Dipped Almond Butter Cookie Bites
April: Walk 8,000 steps a day; Recipe: Herb-Flecked Spring Couscous
May: 180 minutes of Nike Training Club; Recipe: Warm Arugula Salad with Maple Mustard Dressing
June: Fresh fruit/veggies at every meal; Recipe: Chickpea Crepes with Grilled Curried Chicken and Mango Salsa
July: 8 different types of exercise; Recipe: Homemade Spinach Wraps with Chopped Greek Salad Filling
August: Relax; Recipe: Green Tea and Zucchini Noodles with Honey Ginger Sauce
September: Average mile pace below 8’10”; Recipe: Potato, Poblano, and Chard Enchiladas with Salsa Verde

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Crispy Brussels Sprout, Lemon Chicken, and Pomegranate Rice Bowl

A Katie at the Kitchen Door original recipe. Serves 4.

• 1 1/2 c. uncooked brown rice
• 1 tsp butter
• 1 1/2 lbs. large brussels sprouts
• 3 TBS olive oil
• sea salt and pepper
• 1 1/2 c. cooked, shredded, rotisserie chicken
• 1/2 c. creme fraiche
• juice from 1/2 fresh lemon
• 1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
• 2 tsp minced fresh chives
• 1 c. fresh pomegranate seeds

1. Rinse the rice in cold water and drain well. Place the rice in a saucepan and add 3 cups of cold water and the butter. Bring to a simmer over medium heat, then reduce the heat to low, cover the pan, and simmer for 35-45 minutes, or until the rice has absorbed all the water and is tender. Remove from the heat and leave covered.
2. Preheat the oven to 400°F. Remove the stems and outer leaves from the brussels sprouts and discard. Slice the trimmed brussels sprouts into round about 1/4 inch think and place the slices on a large rimmed baking sheet. Add any leaves that have fallen off to the pan as well. Drizzle the brussels sprouts with the olive oil, then sprinkle generously with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper and use a spatula to flip the sprouts so they are evenly coated with the mixture. Roast until golden brown and crispy on the edges, about 20-25 minutes, flipping once about halfway through.
3. In a small bowl, whisk together the creme fraiche, lemon juice, black pepper, and chives until evenly combined. Season to taste with sea salt. If your rotisserie chicken is still warm, simply toss the creme fraiche sauce with the chicken to thoroughly coat. If the chicken is cold, reheat the chicken in the microwave or on the stovetop, and then toss with the sauce.
4. Mix together the rice, chicken, roasted brussels sprouts, and fresh pomegranate seeds. Serve warm.

The post Monthly Fitness Goals: November // Crispy Brussels Sprout, Lemon Chicken, and Pomegranate Rice Bowl appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

Even though January, February and March felt never-ending, I find myself very surprised that it’s already June. Is this what it feels like to get old, the weeks seemingly disappearing into months like it’s nothing? Oi. It’s not a bad thing, but my life feels full, in a good way, and time is flying by. Given that I might have to spend the better part of August and September in Malaysia for work, I feel like I really have to make the most of summer in June and July, including, of course, sticking with my monthly fitness goals – it is bikini (or at least one-piece?) season after all.

I did a good job with exercise in May, even though I had a ten day, three-stop business trip that could have potentially thrown a wrench in my workout schedule. Not only did I complete my May goal of getting 180 minutes of strength training in (although it came down to the wire, with my last Nike Training Club session just squeezed in on the 31st), I also kept up with the running, clocking over 55 miles at an average pace that was 6 seconds faster than April. I feel good, and now I just have to maintain both components even as the weather gets hotter and working out becomes a sweatier proposition.

However, I did not do so well with my eating habits last month. Business trips are rarely good for my eating habits – too many three-course meals paid for by our hosts, an especially difficult thing to turn down in a world-class food city like Rome – but even when I was at home, I found myself eating out or resorting to cheese and crackers for dinner all too often. This month, I want to be better organized and prepared, bringing healthy lunches to work whenever I can, planning ahead for wholesome dinners, and, if I can really commit myself to this, kicking the daily latte and muffin/cookie habit I seemed to have developed over the past month (it used to be a less frequent habit, but I have somehow slipped into a pattern where I run downstairs to grab one on a daily basis now). Besides planning ahead, I want to rely more on fresh fruits and vegetables for my meals, especially since we’ve finally arrived in the season where a variety of local New England produce is available (beyond radishes and rhubarb, that is). So, the official goal? Have at least one serving of fruits or veggies at every meal (ideally fresh, but I’m not going to fault myself for having a bowl of vegetarian chili at dinner or lightly sauteed spinach in my omelets). I’m also going to try and make most of my afternoon snacks fruit or veggie based – replacing cookies and pretzels with apples and crudités. We’ll see how that goes in practice, but I swear I’ll try.

In that vein, this month’s recipe is packed with flavor, color, and freshness, while still being filling and balanced. I recently received a review copy of Golubka’s The Vibrant Table, and the very first night I flipped through it, I ended up making the Chickpea Crepes with Mango Salsa for dinner. Of course, once I’m inspired, just leaving recipes the way they are is very difficult for me, so I tweaked this and that and ended up with a recipe that’s a perfect dinner for me. The biggest change is obviously the addition of grilled chicken marinated in a curry yogurt sauce – I felt like I needed some more bulk to make this a stand-alone meal – but I also swapped out some of the flavors for a more Indian profile (cumin seeds instead of sesame seeds in the crepes, mint and basil instead of cilantro in the salsa), played with the consistency of the crepes to make them more pliable, and added a bunch of sweet red pepper to the salsa for even more color and freshness. The resulting meal is bursting with flavor, and just the kind of thing I need to get me excited about eating fresh vegetables.

Past Fitness Challenges

January: 10 Visits to the YMCA; Recipe: Gluten-Free Olive-and-Feta Corn Muffins
February: One vegan meal every day; Recipe: Pakistani Chickpea Pulao with Sweet-Hot Date-Onion Chutney
March: Run 40  miles in 20 days; Recipe: Chocolate-Dipped Almond Butter Cookie Bites
April: Walk 8,000 steps a day; Recipe: Herb-Flecked Spring Couscous
May: 180 minutes of Nike Training Club; Recipe: Warm Arugula Salad with Maple Mustard Dressing

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Chickpea Crepes with Grilled Curry Chicken and Mango Salsa

Inspired by The Vibrant Table. Serves 4.

For the chicken:

• 1 c. plain Greek yogurt
• 2 TBS olive oil
• 2 TBS curry powder
• 4 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
• 1 tsp sea salt
• 4 medium boneless skinless chicken breasts

For the crepes:

• 2 c. chickpea flour
• 2 TBS whole cumin seeds
• 2 tsp ground turmeric
• 2 tsp sea salt
• 2 1/2 to 3 c. water
• 1 large egg
• vegetable oil for frying

For the mango salsa:

• 1 large ripe mango, peeled, pitted, and diced into 1/2 inch cubes
• 1 red bell pepper, cored and diced into 1/2 inch pieces
• 1 small cucumber, peeled, seeded, and diced into 1/2 inch cubes
• 1/3 c. very finely chopped red onion (from about 1/4 of a large onion)
• 1 jalapeno, seeded and finely minced
• juice from 1-2 fresh limes
• 1/2 tsp sea salt
• small handful of mint leaves, sliced into chiffonade
• small handful of basil leaves, sliced into chiffonade

1. To make the chicken: Mix the yogurt, olive oil, curry powder, crushed garlic, and 1 tsp of salt together in a large bowl until evenly combine. Add the chicken breasts and rub the curry marinade all over them to fully coat. Cover the bowl and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, and up to overnight.
2. To make the crepes: Whisk together the chickpea flour, cumin seeds, turmeric, and salt. Add the water 1/2 cup at a time, whisking until as smooth as possible between batches. Resulting batter should be runny but not watery. Add the egg and whisk to blend with the batter. Cover the batter bowl and let rest for at least 30 minutes, and ideally 1 hour.
3. To make the salsa: Mix together all salsa ingredients in a medium bowl. Taste and adjust seasoning (lime juice, salt, jalapeno, and herbs) to your taste.
4. When you are ready to eat: Fire up your grill and preheat. Grill the chicken for 6-8 minutes on each side, until cooked all the way through with no pink left in the middle (grilling time may vary significantly depending on the temperature of your grill and  the thickness of your chicken – always check that they are cooked in the middle before serving!). Set cooked chicken aside.
5. Heat 2 tsp of vegetable oil over medium heat in a large frying pan. Once hot, add half a cup of the crepe batter and quickly swirl the pan to allow the batter to run into a large circle. Cook crepes for 30-60 seconds on each side, until golden brown and bubbly, then flip. Stack cooked crepes on a serving platter. Slice cooked chicken and serve over the warm crepes alongside the mango salsa. Serve as soon as possible after cooking, although leftover crepes can be wrapped in tinfoil and stored in the fridge if necessary.

The post Monthly Fitness Goals: June // Chickpea Crepes with Grilled Curry Chicken and Mango Salsa appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

The Book: The newest cookbook on my shelf is Eating with the Chefs, a photography-driven book that documents the family meals served at the world’s greatest restaurants. The goal of the book: to take you behind the scenes, into the kitchens and after-hours, to experience the “family life” of the people who make these restaurants run, and the “honest, simple food” they make for each other outside of the dining room. From the pillars of America’s modern dining scene (The French Laundry, Chez Panisse, Blue Hill at Stone Barns), to the international innovators that have been making global headlines for the past few years (Noma, Attica, Mugaritz), you will get a little taste of the experience and flavors of each restaurant, without needing to hop on a plane and fly to Denmark/Australia/Spain (as nice as that would be if you could). Like all of Phaidon’s books, Eating with the Chefs is gorgeously designed, an art book as much as a cookbook, if not more. The pages are thick and matte, the text sparse, and the stories are told primarily through the gorgeous and subtle photographs of Per-Anders Jorgensen, the book’s creator. The restaurant stories and recipes are found interspersed between the pictures in text “inserts,” further emphasizing the focus on the photography. It’s a book you’ll want to leave out on the coffee table. As for the recipes themselves, between the seemingly universal unwritten rule that family meals should be straightforward and comforting and the immense talent and creativity of the chefs cooking them, the 50 recipes included in this book fall right in the sweet spot of how I love to cook.

The Food: As soon as I saw the recipe for Indian Butter Chicken in Eating with the Chefs, I knew it had to be the first recipe I tried. I’m forever on the hunt for recipes that accurately approximate my favorite Indian takeout dishes, but making good Indian food requires such a thorough study of cooking techniques and knowledge of Indian pantry ingredients that it can be a real challenge. I’ve had good success with recipes like these Pea and Potato Parathas and this Pakistani Chickpea Pulao, but none of them have been “takeout-y,” by which I mean over-the-top rich and spicy and addictive. As you might expect from one of Australia’s pre-eminent chefs, this recipe hit all the right notes of great Indian food – creamy, spicy, salty, savory – and was perfectly balanced. I’m really excited to have added this one to my repertoire, and if the other recipes in the book are as dead-on as this one was, I’m going to have a lot more dinners in my rotation.

Recipe Shortlist: Basque-Style Garlic Soup; Emmer Wheat Foccaccia; Quark Pillows with Corn and Grilled Peaches; Holiday Cannelloni; Squab Torte; Roast Chicken with Apple and Onion Confit and Pommes Mousseline; Lentil Stew with Pork Ribs; Quay’s Green Chicken Curry; Chocolate Ripple Cake

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Disclaimer: I received a review copy of Eating with the Chefs from Phaidon, but I was not otherwise compensated and all thought and opinions are my own.

Indian Butter Chicken

Recipe from Eating with the Chefs. Serves 2.

• 1/2 c. plain Greek yogurt
• 2 tsp lemon juice
• 1 1/2 tsp ground turmeric
• 1 1/2 tsp garam masala
• 1 1/2 tsp ground cumin
• 1 lb. 2 oz. skinless chicken breasts or thighs
• 3 TBS butter
• 1 tsp vegetable oil
• 1 small onion, peeled and finely chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, peeled and finely chopped
• 1 TBS grated fresh ginger
• 1 TBS whole cumin seeds
• 1 small cinnamon stick
• 1/3 c. canned diced tomatoes
• 1 fresh red chile, seeded and sliced
• 1/4 c. chicken stock
• 1/2 c. heavy cream
• 1/2 tsp tomato paste
• 1 TBS ground almonds
• 3 sprigs fresh cilantro, to garnish
• salt to taste

1. Combine the yogurt, lemon juice, turmeric, salt (to taste, approximately 1/2 tsp), garam masala, and ground cumin in a small bowl and stir to combine. Pour over the chicken, making sure chicken is fully coated, cover, and refrigerate for 24 hours.
2. When ready to cook, melt the butter and oil in a large pan over medium heat. Add the onions and cook for about 10 minutes or until translucent, stirring occasionally. Stir in the garlic, ginger, and cumin seeds, and cook for 3 minutes, until spices are fragrant and onions are lightly browned.
3. Add the cinnamon stick, diced tomatoes, and sliced chile to the pan and season with salt, then cook over medium heat for 10 minutes. Add the chicken and it’s marinade to the pan and stir to combine, then cook for another 5 minutes.
4. Add the chicken broth to the pan and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer for 30 minutes. Stir in the cream and tomato paste, and cook for another 10-15 minutes, or until the chicken is fully cooked through. Stir in the ground almonds and cook for a final 5 minutes. Serve with rice, garnished with fresh cilantro.

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The Book: If you’re even a little bit of a Francophile, or have ever found yourself daydreaming of a vacation in France punctuated by long dinners in the countryside, you’re going to want to get yourself a copy of Hungry for France. A cross between a memoir, a travel guide, and a cookbook, with all three components tied together by a love of French food, this book will have you planning your next vacation and tomorrow’s dinner at the same time. The book covers 13 regions in France, alternating notes about the best inns and restaurants in each region with recipes inspired by memorable dinners in those same establishments. As a result, the recipes are hyper-local to their particular corner of France, with hearty dishes like Cheese and Bacon Tarts from the Alps, and fresh, warm-weather seafood dishes like Roasted John Dory with Tomatoes and Olives from Cote d’Azur. By separating the recipes into these regional sections, the author highlights the wonderful variety of French cuisine – from delicate cream-filled pastry, to rich duck confit, to grilled seafood dishes, to hearty alpine stews, it’s all here. I love the recipes that are included in the book – they present slightly unexpected but still traditional flavor combinations that sound highly craveable, the kind of dishes I’d order from a restaurant in a heartbeat. They aren’t the French “basics,” – they’re modern and interesting, but still quintessentially French. There are as many recipes for sweet dishes as savory, which is good, because the French do both so well that it would be a shame to leave either one out. Although I haven’t nearly finished reading all the notes about different restaurants and destinations, what I have read perfectly captures the romance and magic of travel, expertly intertwined with practical advice about where to eat, sleep, and drink in France.

The Food: The night I planned to test a recipe from Hungry for France for this review, I came home from work completely exhausted and almost defaulted to plain spaghetti for dinner instead, until Trevor rescued the evening and said he’d do all the shopping and cooking if I could stay awake long enough to take pictures. I readily agreed, and very happily sat at the kitchen counter enjoying a glass of Chardonnay while Trevor made a lovely dinner for us. This Pistachio-Stuffed Chicken with Parmesan Cream Sauce was relatively quick to pull together, but it had lovely, nuanced flavors from all the herbs and different liqueurs used, and made for a very elegant, restaurant-quality dish. We served it with a warm orzo and pesto salad for a perfect little dinner (and the leftovers were just as good for lunch the next day). I particularly liked that the recipe used both vermouth and grappa in it – all the alcohol cooks off, but the flavors remained distinct. It will definitely be a repeat dinner dish in our house, and I can’t wait to try other recipes from this book.

Recipe Shortlist: Green Asparagus with Chorizo Vinaigrette; Nanterre French Toast with Honeyed Nectarines; Golden Endive and Chard Gratin; White-Wine Steamed Mussels with Andouille Sausage; Curried Pork in Cider Sauce; Hot Buckwheat Rolls; Hazelnut-Crusted Goat Cheese with Rhubarb-Raspberry Compote; Hot Chartreuse Souffle; Truffled Eggs en Cocotte with Prosciutto Toasts

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Disclaimer: I received a review copy of Hungry for France free of charge from Rizzoli, but I was not otherwise compensated and all thought and opinions are my own.

Pistachio-Stuffed Chicken Breasts with Parmesan Cream Sauce

Recipe from Hungry for France. Serves 4.

•  1/4 c. milk
• 1 sprig fresh thyme
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 garlic clove, peeled and crushed
• 1 thick slice white bread, crust removed
• 3 TBS olive oil
• 4 shallots, peeled and finely chopped
• 1/4 c. dry vermouth
• 1/4 c. finely chopped roasted, salted pistachios
• kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 4 boneless chicken breasts, trimmed of excess fat
• 2 TBS grappa
• 1 c. chicken stock
• 1/4 c. heavy cream
• 3 TBS grated Parmesan cheese
• 2 TBS butter
• fleur de sel (or sea salt) for finishing
• chervil sprigs, for finishing (optional)

1. In a small saucepan, heat milk with thyme, bay leaf, and garlic over medium heat, just until bubbles appear around the edge, about 1 minute. Remove from heat and strain into a shallow bowl. Add the bread and let stand for 10 minutes, turning once. Drain and squeeze dry, then finely chop and transfer to a medium bowl.
2. In a medium frying pan, heat 1 TBS of the olive oil over medium heat. Add the shallots and cook until softened, about 2 minutes. Stir in vermouth and cook until nearly evaporated, about 2-3 minutes. Remove pan from heat. Scrape  half of the shallots into the bowl with the bread, and add the chopped pistachios. Reserve the other half of the shallots for later.
3. Using a sharp knife, cut a slit lengthwise into the side of each chicken breast. Use a spoon to stuff a few TBS of the bread and pistachio filling into the slit of each breast, and pinch together to seal.
4. In a large frying pan, heat the remaining 2 TBS of olive oil over medium heat for 1-2 minutes, or until hot. Season the chicken with salt and pepper, then add to the hot pan and cook until browned, about 5 minutes on each side. Check to be sure chicken is cooked all the way through by cutting into the center of the fattest breast. However, try not to overcook the chicken as it will dry out fairly quickly. Remove the chicken breasts from the pan and set aside.
5. Add the grappa to the reserved shallots in the medium frying pan and bring to a simmer over medium-low heat. Very carefully tilt the pan and use a long match or lighter to ignite the vermouth. When the flames subside, add the chicken stock and bring to a simmer, cooking until reduced to half a cup , about 4-5 minutes. Add the heavy cream and simmer until reduced to half a cup, about 3 minutes. Remove the skillet from the heat and stir in the parmesan cheese and butter until both are fully melted. Transfer to a blender and process until frothy.
6. Ladle the sauce into the bottom of 4 bowls and top each with a piece of chicken. Finish with a sprinkle of fleur de sel and a few sprigs of chervil.

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Olives, Lemons, & Za’atar: The Best Middle Eastern Home Cooking

The Book: This spring has seen a lot of Middle-Eastern themed cookbook releases, including Istanbul, Flavors of the Middle East, and Under the Shade of Olive Trees. The first one to grace our bookshelves is Rawia Bishara’s Olives, Lemons, and Za’atar. By the chef-owner of Tanoreen restaurant in Brooklyn, it’s a book filled with recipes that feel both modern and traditional, an elevated but still accessible take on a rural cuisine. Rawia does not treat her family’s cooking style rigidly, but rather lets it grow and evolve based on inspiration from her travels throughout Europe and her years in New York. Many of the resulting recipes are loaded with summer produce, which feels a little bit like torture right now, but is also filling me with inspiration for what to do with all those eggplants and peppers we’ll have come August. I especially can’t wait to try the Eggplant Napoleon, a stack of fried, pesto-marinated eggplant slices served with a slather of baba ghanouj, fresh tomatoes, and more pesto. I’m also drawn toward the big family dinner and feast dishes that she shares – big platters of meat and grains and vegetables, all heavily spiced and sauced – they feel festive and complete and make me want to gather friends around my table more often. The bright flavors that Rawia presents are echoed heavily in the book’s clean design and photography – the pictures in the book are wonderfully colorful and energetic, immediately transporting me to a warmer climate where food and color are abundant. It’s a book filled with light, flavor and summertime, for sure.

The Food: So far, we’ve made two dishes from Olives, Lemons, and Za’atar, and both were probably more appropriate for a grand feast than for dinner for two, but I have no regrets about either of them. Featured here is Maftool, the word for Palestinian (better known as Israeli) couscous, but that also refers to a traditional feast dish that uses the couscous as a base. This recipe adorns the couscous with chicken, chickpeas, and pearl onions, all beautifully spiced with a mix of caraway, allspice, cumin, coriander, and other warm spices. I really liked the technique for this dish – after spice-coating and browning the chicken, you add the chickpeas, onions, and several quarts of water to a pot with the chicken to simmer until the chicken is very tender, simultaneously making a gorgeous spiced chicken broth. Then, when it’s time to cook the couscous, you ladle the broth out of the pot onto the couscous, meaning the whole meal is infused with the flavors of the broth and spices. I cooked the couscous just a moment too long, leaving me with a crunchy, caramelized layer on the bottom of the pot – but after trying those crunchy couscous bits, I wouldn’t cook it any other way. The meal is served on one platter – couscous topped with the chicken pieces, lightly shredded, the chickpeas, and the pearl onions. It’s an aromatic, filling, and wholesome dish, perfect for serving a crowd in the winter. As an aside, the recipe headnote states that this dish makes enough for four, but we got at least eight servings out if it – it really makes an obscene amount of food. Plus as a byproduct, you have a delicious pot of chicken and chickpea soup, which I quickly stashed in the freezer for my next cold. The other dish we tried was a braised lamb shank dish which Trevor prepared, served with potatoes and a fresh tomato sauce. Again, the meat was beautifully spiced, and the addition of a cup of basil made it smell like summer. I think we’ll be cooking from this book for a while.

Recipe Shortlist: Brussels Sprouts with Tahini, Pomegranate Molasses, and Panko; Za’atar Bread; Cauliflower Salad with Tahini and Pomegranate; Sweet Pea and Kafta Stew; Eggplant Napoleon; Smoked Wheat with Lamb; Garlic Sauce for Roasted Chicken; Flower-Scented Custard with Pistachios

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Disclaimer: I received a review copy of Olives, Lemons, & Za’atar free of charge from Kyle Books, but I was not otherwise compensated and all thought and opinions are my own.

Maftool: Palestinian Couscous with Chicken, Chickpeas, and Pearl Onions

Recipe adapted slightly from Olives, Lemons, & Za’atar. Serves 8.

• 2 TBS ground caraway seeds
• 1 TBS ground allspice
• 1 TBS ground cumin
• 1 TBS ground coriander
• 1 TBS sea salt
• 1 TBS freshly ground black pepper
• 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
• 1/2 tsp ground cardamom
• 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 chicken (2 1/2 to 3 pounds), cut into 8 pieces
• 8 TBS olive oil, divided
• 2 lbs. fresh pearl onions, peeled (blanch first to make peeling easier)
• 3 yellow onions, roughly chopped
• 1 lb. dried chickpeas, soaked overnight, then boiled until tender; or 2 (15 oz.) cans of chickpeas, drained and rinsed
• 2 lemons
• 2 lbs. Israeli couscous

1. In a small bowl, combine the first 9 ingredients, stirring to mix. Rub half of this spice mixture all over the chicken pieces. Set aside the other half of the spice mix.
2. Add 4 TBS of olive oil to a large, heavy-bottomed stock pot. Heat over medium heat, then add the chicken pieces in batches, skin-side down, being careful not to crowd the chicken. Brown the chicken for 6-8 minutes per side, until golden brown. Use tongs to transfer the chicken pieces to a plate. Repeat with any remaining chicken pieces.
3. Add the pearl onions and chopped yellow onions to the olive oil and saute until they begin to brown, about 5 to 7 minutes. Return the chicken pieces to the pot and add the chickpeas and 3 quarts of water. Raise the heat and bring to a boil, skimming any foam from the surface of the pot. Reduce the heat, cover, and simmer until the chicken is falling off the bone, 45 minutes to 1 hour. Stir in the juice of 1 lemon, and remove from heat.
4. About 20 minutes before the chicken is done, add the remaining 4 TBS of olive oil to a large saucepan and heat over medium heat. Add the couscous, stirring to coat with the olive oil, and saute until fragrant, about 2-3 minutes. Add the reserved spice mixture and stir to coat grains, then saute for 1 minute. Ladle 6 cups of the broth from the chicken pot into the couscous and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat, cover, and simmer until the couscous is tender and the liquid is absorbed, about 10-15 minutes. Remove from heat and let stand for 10 minutes.
5. To serve, spoon the couscous onto a large platter and top with the chicken pieces, chickpeas, and onions. Reserve any leftover broth for another use (or it makes a delicious soup on its own with some of the extra chicken in it).

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 I can’t believe Christmas is only ten days away. I was in St. Petersburg for a quick trip from last Tuesday to Saturday, then yesterday flew over to Madrid. It’s always exciting to travel, but both trips have been fairly busy, and I’m missing out on critical Christmas-preparation time (thank God for Amazon Prime). Knowing I would feel this way, I made sure that last weekend was Christmas-activity heavy – we went and picked out a tree (our first! Trevor even let me take a gratuitous self-timer picture in front of it), played carols, watched Love Actually, and made this gorgeous roasted duck for the next round of the Captain Morgan Captain’s Table Challenge.

After making a sweetish side-dish for the last round, we knew that this time around we wanted to do a stunning, savory, Christmas dinner centerpiece. This whole roast duck with a pomegranate, orange and rum glaze is just that. The flavors are a perfect mix of fruity, bright, herbal, and salty; the skin is golden and crispy; the meat is tender. Surrounded by a boozy chestnut, apple, and pancetta stuffing that echoes all the flavors in the duck itself, it’s the perfect thing to grace your Christmas dinner table if you’re having a small gathering. I genuinely loved the complexity the rum gave to both the duck and the stuffing, and I might have to make the whole thing again soon even if just for a cozy Sunday night dinner.

Also, I have to take a moment to brag here (not a humblebrag, I’m still working on that skill) – Trevor and I won the first round of the Captain’s Table Challenge with our sweet-potato souffle and sparkling cranberry-ginger cocktail! I think the most exciting part for me is that Hugh Acheson was the judge, and it feels quite validating to have a successful chef say your recipe seems decent. Finding out was just the momentum we needed to come up with this duck recipe. Stay tuned for our drinkable submission to the Christmas round later this week – Trevor’s been testing out cocktails while I’ve been away, so he’s getting to be an expert on rum-based Christmas drinks.

Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by Captain Morgan, who provided me with product samples and monetary compensation in exchange for my participation in this program. All opinions are honest and my own, as always.

Rum-and-Pomegranate Glazed Roast Duck

Serves 4.

For the duck:

• One 5-lb. whole duck
• 1 TBS coarse sea salt
• 1 TBS finely chopped rosemary + 3 whole sprigs rosemary
• 1 tsp freshly ground black pepper
• zest of 1 orange, finely grated
• juice from 1 orange
• 2 c. pomegranate juice
• 1/2 c. Captain Morgan Original Spiced Rum
• pomegranate-rum glaze (see below)

1. Preheat the oven to 450°F. Remove giblets from cavity of duck and reserve for another use. Pat the duck dry and place on a cutting board. Cut off any excess skin, as well as the wing tips (to prevent burning). Truss the bird by tying the legs together over the front side using kitchen twine, tucking the tail between the legs. Score fat on breast-side of duck all over in a cross-hatch pattern, making sure to cut down to the meat. Flip the duck over and prick the back and the legs all over with a sharp knife.
2. Add the salt, 1 TBS of chopped rosemary, black pepper, and orange zest to a mortar and pestle, and pound until rosemary is crushed and mixture is somewhat moist. Rub the paste all over the duck, making sure to get under the skin. Place the duck in a roasting pan. Pour the orange juice, pomegranate juice, and rum over the duck into the bottom of the pan – bottom of the pan should be covered by liquid to a depth of a quarter inch, if it is not, add more pomegranate juice. Add the rosemary sprigs to the liquid, and place duck in the oven.
3. Roast the duck, for 2 hours and 30 minutes, basting the duck with the pan juices every 15-20 minutes. Before the last 15 minutes of cooking, take the duck out of the oven and brush all over with the prepared glaze, then finish off. Let rest 5-10 minutes before carving.

For the glaze:

• 1/2 c. drippings
• 1/2 c. Captain Morgan Original Spiced Rum
• 1/4 c. pomegranate molasses
• juice from 1/2 orange

1. Add all ingredients to a small saucepan. Simmer over medium heat until reduced to a syrup, about 10-15 minutes.

Boozy Chestnut-Apple Stuffing

Inspired by Yankee Magazine. Serves 4.

• 1 large baguette, cut into 1/2 inch cubes
• 3 TBS olive oil
• 1/4 lb. pancetta, cut into 1/4 inch cubes
• 1 large onion, peeled and diced
• 2 honeycrisp apples, cored and cut into 1/4 inch cubes
• 1 1/2 c. roasted chestnuts
• 1 TBS minced fresh rosemary
• salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 2 eggs
• 3/4 c. chicken stock
• 1/4 c. Captain Morgan Original Spiced Rum
• seeds from 1 pomegranate

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Toss the bread cubes with the olive oil and spread on a baking sheet. Toast in the oven until golden brown and crispy, about 10 minutes.
2. Place a medium frying pan over medium heat. Add the cubed pancetta and fry until crispy on all sides, stirring frequently, about 10 minutes. Remove from the pan and set aside. Add the onion and apple to the pan with the pancetta fat and saute until the onion is soft and translucent and the apples are beginning to soften, about 10 minutes. Toss the onion and apple with the cooked pancetta, then stir in the chestnuts and rosemary. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
3. In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs, chicken stock, and rum. Add the toasted bread crumbs to this mixture and toss to coat, then add the apple-chestnut mixture and stir to combine. Butter a medium baking dish, then pour the stuffing into the prepared baking dish. Bake until the top of the stuffing is golden and crispy, about 30-35 minutes. Serve immediately, sprinkled with the pomegranate seeds.

The post Captain’s Table Christmas // Rum-and-Pomegranate Glazed Roast Duck with Boozy Chestnut-Apple Stuffing appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.