Salmon, Orzo and Arugula Pesto en Papillote

We probably eat fish once a week, and salmon tends to be our easy go-to selection. While we like it prepared very simply (salt, pepper, splash of olive oil on top -- either baked or grilled), sometimes it is nice to mix it up with something a little different. 

I found an easy recipe online that would add a little something different to the salmon. The recipe called for an arugula pesto that was pre-made and mixed in with orzo. 

I think this recipe turned out only okay. Full disclosure -- we didn't have parchment paper, so I used aluminum foil instead. From what I have read online, they are somewhat interchangeable, but the foil conducts heat better than the parchment paper, which may explain why I wasn't as happy with the result. 

I didn't love the taste of the arugula pesto -- and it was almost too bland when mixed in with the orzo. The orzo is also super soft and cooked by the time you eat it, since you've boiled it like regular pasta and then baked it with the salmon. 

I'm not sure if I would make this recipe again. I think I would try something different and would cook the fish in parchment paper. We have made fish using parchment paper before, and I have liked the way things turned out, so I think the method is sound -- just maybe another set of ingredients. 

Double Chocolate Biscotti

I wouldn't say that I'm a particularly good cook, but I'm certainly better at cooking than I am at baking. I spotted this recipe for double chocolate biscotti -- and thought that I could give this baking thing another shot. 

The recipe was super easy to make. The recipe author has several other biscotti recipes on her website, which I am definitely going to try.

It is a little challenging to move the loaves if you form them somewhere else besides the baking sheet. I had to move quickly holding the loaf up in the air so it wouldn't fall apart as I moved it over to the baking sheet. The loaf is soft and pliable, so breaks easily -- even after the first round of baking. 

The orange zest is a nice bright touch. The biscotti turn out a bit crispy, but certainly not as crunchy as I expected. They aren't as soft as a brownie, but you don't need to dip them in coffee or another beverage to soften them up enough to eat. That didn't stop me from having a couple with some coffee ice cream...which I'd recommend. 

Enjoy!

Hunter's Chicken -- from our French Cooking Class ages ago

We first made this recipe in a French cooking class last fall. It was flavorful and different that your typical chicken dish. Since I'm not able to link to the recipe online anywhere, I'll post the details next before the photos, then add my commentary. 

Ingredient List:

4 lbs of chicken white and dark meat  
5 shallots 
2 pints of sliced button mushroom  
2 tablespoon of butter 
¼ cup oil  
1 cup of white wine  
¼ cup of Cognac (we used bourbon instead)  
1 lbs of cubed tomato 
1/2 quart of chicken stock   
1 tablespoon of flour  
½ cup of heavy cream 
1 bunch of parsley for garnish 
Salt & Pepper


Preparation:
1. Mince shallots. Place shallots in a pot over medium heat with 2 tablespoon of butter. Stir shallots once to 
cover them in butter, and then let them cook until all have softened and are slightly starting to brown. Deglaze them once with white wine, if necessary. Then move the shallots to the outskirts of the pot and add the oil. 

2.  When the oil is hot, add the chicken and cook until colored on each side. Remove the chicken and toss the mushrooms in. Mix them in, along with the shallots, until they start coloring. Add the flour in and mix to create a roux.  
  
3.  Deglaze with the white wine and the chicken stock, then add the tomatoes. When it’s sizzling, flambé with 
Cognac and then add the cream. Stir for a few minutes.  

4. Put the chicken back into the pot, and let it slowly cook covered for 20 to 25 min. When the sauce has
thickened again, bring to a slight boil and turn off the heat. 

5. Right before serving, add some freshly chopped parsley to the dish. Serve it with the sauce covering the chicken.

The recipe was a little difficult to follow (I edited it slightly so that it made more sense to the reader), but I think we were able to capture the same flavors as we did in the cooking class when we made it at home. We did not flambé the sauce, but rather just added the alcohol (we used bourbon) in to the mixture and cooked off the alcohol. I don't think we changed anything by not doing the flambé (other than missing out on something cool to try/starting a potential fire), but we cooked the sauce longer than suggested just to be sure the liquor was burned off.

We served the chicken with some roasted carrots and parsnips, which went really well with the rustic-style chicken. 

Polenta con Ragu

On a cold, snowy Saturday, I think you need something warm and hearty for dinner. Like a healthy portion of  polenta con ragu. The ragu takes a while to make, but it's delicious and worth it if you have the time. We found our recipe here (which you can translate into English). We have made the ragu several times since. 

The ragu takes several hours to make, but is a delicious sauce with lots of depth. If you have a few hours to just let it cook on the stove on a Saturday or Sunday, it's definitely better than a regular jarred marinara with meat added. The ingredients are very basic, and you can let it simmer, stirring occasionally with little fanfare. We have since started adding a few tablespoons of milk at the end, as mentioned in the recipe.    

The polenta doesn't have a ton of flavor, so the bulk of what you taste is from the ragu. If we make the polenta with ragu again, we talked about adding some roasted garlic to jazz up the polenta a bit. We also topped the final product with shaved parmesan which melts right into the meat. 

The recipe makes a large amount of ragu, plenty more than you need for the polenta. We used the rest of the ragu as a regular meat sauce on pasta later in the week. 

Homemade Papaya Sorbet

We borrowed an ice cream attachment from a friend to use with out stand mixer. We decided on papaya because we had one in the house that was bridging on overripe. 

Straining the pureed papaya

Chilling the simple syrup

Pureed and strained papaya

Blending the simple syrup and the papaya

 Beginning to mix the sorbet in the ice cream attachment

Fully mixed and ready to eat

Finished product!

I would definitely try making either sorbet or ice cream again with the attachment. While you do need to prepare ahead of time by freezing the bowl an prepping the fruit, it's relatively easy to make and can be accomplished in a few steps. I'm not sure I would use papaya again - it was more naturally sweet, and in combination with the simple syrup, pushed it a little too far into the "sweet" realm that I would have liked. 

Winter Panzanella

It has been a terribly long time since the last post, but I'm back on the horse again! 

Paul and I were looking for some winter dinner inspiration, and I found a recipe for a delicious sounding winter panzanella. Paul loves Brussels sprouts, I love butternut squash -- seemed like a good choice. 

We didn't have sherry vinegar, so we made a concoction of sherry and white wine vinegar to soak the red onions, which I'm not sure came out the way it should have. I also totally spaced on using the gray salt, and instead used regular salt with the onions. Oops. I thought there were too many raw onions (and raw onion taste) -- maybe flavor was dulled by using the wrong salt and the lack of sherry vinegar? 

Enjoying the winter colors (and our new camera which captures them quite well)!

Overall, I think it turned out pretty good. As the author of the post (and others) commented, you certainly use a lot of dishes! I would definitely roast both the squash and the croutons together in the future. I'd also do less red onion -- while pretty, I don't need much raw onion to give me that onion-ey taste. Paul and I also thought the addition of chick peas or cannellini beans would be good in the future. Lastly, I'd actually use sherry vinegar instead of whatever crazy mixture we made in hopes of getting the correct flavor next time!

Pork Chops with Peppers and Capers

We got all motivated to try some new recipes last week, including this tasty pork chop recipe. We purchased rib pork chops (I think I normally get the loin? I don't even know) to use, as directed by the recipe. Granted, I've never made this before, but I was impressed with how it turned out!

You do need to prep a little beforehand -- making the brine and soaking the pork chops overnight. We also forgot to pick up black olives, so omitted those.

Making the brine

Prepping all the veggies

Here is the pork, taken out of the brine and drying before dredging in flour.

Browning the pork chops

Mixed all together with the peppers, capers and green onions

Final product on the plate!

It was quite tasty -- definitely better than I expected -- and pretty easy as well! I am not a huge salt person (Paul prefers things saltier than I do), and I thought this was nicely balanced. I loved all the brightly colored peppers, and they went really well with the meat. Enjoy!

Salmon with Lemon, Capers and Rosemary

Looking to jazz up some salmon, we found an easy recipe online that included ingredients we already had at home. Adding lemon juice, lemon slices, chopped rosemary, capers and marsala cooking wine helped create a simple dinner that tasted delicious.

Cooking them on the grill in the foil packets keeps everything bundled nicely and is easy for clean up! No scrubbing of the grill needed. If you like your salmon more on the rare side, you may want to do a little less than 10 minutes. Everything steams inside the foil packet, and the flavors of lemon and marsala (and the saltiness of the capers) impart onto the salmon.
 

We served the salmon alongside some couscous with raisins and a side salad. I liked this recipe because it just added a little something to basic (albeit delicious) salmon.

Pesto Chicken Sandwiches

I'm a big fan of repurposing leftovers, and Paul had a great idea this week, We had leftover grilled chicken breasts, that had been marinated in a little olive oil and herbs de provence. Paul suggested we make pesto chicken sandwiches with the leftover pieces. 

We threw together a quick pesto (basil leaves, some leftover chopped walnuts, olive oil, Parmesan cheese... I forgot garlic!) in the food processor. I think the pesto looks so dark because we used walnuts instead of pine nuts. which are lighter in color.
 

We served them on hoagie buns, with a smear of pesto, some melted mozzarella and tomato slices. Delicious! Easy to make and cheaper than going out for lunch on Sunday.

French Cooking Class

For Paul's last birthday, I bought him (well, us) a French cooking lesson. We finally redeemed our class last Friday evening. We attended a class at Cook Au Vin, which is in Chicago. They make it very clear that while we are actually going to be cooking, we're able to drink some wine and have fun at the same time.

We cooked the Vuitton Menu, with a couple changes. We did a roasted mixed vegetable dish instead of the Tournee vegetables -- and we had a prune pudding instead of a lemon pie.

Our prune puddings cooling -- we had to make these first.

Paul and our chef/teacher for the evening

Prepping all the ingredients

Putting together our scallop appetizer (cooked in a ceramic shell)

Paul stirring the main dish (Hunter's Chicken)

The roasted vegetables awaiting dinner

The finished scallops!

Overall, I thought it was a fun and interesting class. We did learn some helpful techniques during the process, like the easiest way to dice an onion, which herbs should go in at the start of a sauce versus the end, and learned more about making a roux. I am always worried that my roux is too thick, but apparently that isn't as big of an issue as I made it!

I thought the food turned out pretty good (considering a bunch of novice chefs were the ones cooking everything!). Our chef was kind and very thorough in explaining why he did things. He also did a great job of managing all the craziness that ensued once people had taken down a couple bottles of wine! I would be interested in doing another class like this in the future and learning some additional techniques.

Fiori di Zucca

One of Paul's patients was kind enough to share some of the squash blossoms she had growing in her garden. We had some delicious fiori di zucca while we were in Italy, so i was super excited to make them again. 

We used a simple recipe we found online (we found many, with variety in terms of the frying batter and the cheese to include inside). This recipe called for ricotta cheese (we had a cup or so left of skim ricotta, and an easy batter of flour, salt, egg and warm water.

The batter was not too bad -- I think I would have used either a little more salt or perhaps a saltier cheese (whether full-fat ricotta or mozzarella). I wanted (and did) add salt to these after I took the first bite.  I also tossed in a little thyme with the filling, which was pretty tasty. You could easily include chopped basil, rosemary, or sage to change up the flavoring of the filling.

They were simple to make and cooked quickly. You definitely want to eat them right away while the breading is still crispy! And I'd avoid eating the stem end (or getting too close to it) as well -- even after taking out the stamen or pistil, it can be bitter. 

I'm hoping we can another batch to fry up before summer is over! 

Grilled Skirt Steak with Poblano-Corn Sauce and Salsa

Food & Wine magazine had several recipes in their most recent issue that included only three ingredients (minus things like salt, pepper and olive oil). We made Grilled Steak with Poblano-Corn Sauce and Salsa. 

It was very simple to make, and tasted very fresh. However, I would make a couple tweaks to the recipe for the next round. 

The recipe suggests grilling the corn and the pepper for just a few minutes -- but I would keep the pepper on much longer. We couldn't peel the pepper, so just ended up dicing it an including it with the skin still on. If you grill the pepper and then cover it with plastic wrap in a bowl, you can essentially rub the skin right off. When it isn't as cooked, it's really difficult to get off. 

I know it's supposed to be a three-ingredient recipe, but I think I would also add cilantro and also lime to the salsa. I don't think it would take too much away from the recipe, and would add some additional flavor without losing the freshness of the recipe.