Haha! Well, fellow food fiends, it's that time again! And while I do have some thoughts to relay about how my first ventures into the Law have been, I would be remiss in breaking my own new format this early. So Law thoughts another day. In a word though: Good.


Monday - Pepper Chicken with Lime Sauce, Rice, Roasted Green Beans

Link for the Green Bean Recipe!
Rice just used a Rice Cooker...

Pepper Chicken with Pepper Lime Dip - Cambodian Dish from the "Savoring Meat and Poultry" book by Williams Sonoma.

Ingredients

2 Boneless Chicken Breasts, with skin
1 teaspoon peppercorn
1 teaspoon sea salt (says coarse salt; I suppose you could use regular salt too)
1/4 cup soy sauce
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoons vegetable oil
6 cloves of garlic, quartered

For the dip: 2 limes, 1 tablespoon ground black pepper, 1 1/2 teaspoon sea salt


Ok, I should start out by stating that the recipe is slightly modified from the one in the book. The book recipe called for like, two whole chickens. But since there are but two of us, I nerfed it down to two breasts. Normally we eat boneless/skinless, but the picture in the book had yummy looking skin so I opted for a bit of extra fat and got some with skin still on. Also, the original recipe called for mushroom soy sauce. I looked at Gelson's for mushroom soy sauce, but I haven't a clue what it is or if it's sold; in all my years of growing up in a semi-Asian household I've never heard of mushroom soy sauce. I wondered if maybe it was something you had to make, but there were no instructions. So I just used regular soy sauce.

For this sucker you have to marinade first. Crushing peppercorns without proper tools is not an experience I would recommend; the book said to use a mortar, but I don't have one. So I used a bowl and an ice cream scoop. It worked out, but it was tiring and in someways quite needless since I do have ground pepper. In any case, you take the peppercorns, quarter the garlic and smoosh it together. The book said to make a paste, but I didn't, I just kinda...mixed it up. I added that to the soy sauce, sugar, oil, and salt and threw it with the chicken into a ziploc bag. I tend to do all my marinating in ziploc bags; you can just throw them away when you're done and they seem to get the job done. It's also easier to concentrate the marinade straight on the meat by turning the bag in certain directions, so when you are marinading for a short period of time (I only marinaded it for 45 minutes) it gets a concentrated effect. Time listed in he book was 1 hour to overnight.

While that sucker was marinading I prepared to use my rice cooker for the first time. Now, attention white people: rice cookers are the ONLY way to make good rice. Period. The end. I don't want to hear arguments about it. You also must use white, long-grain rice; I've always eaten Calrose and had good experiences with it. I've seen people try to make rice other ways and it never comes out the same. Besides, why go through the trouble? With a rice cooker it's dump in the rice, dump in the water, push a button, wait twenty minutes. It's super easy and super effective, so don't go and start boiling stuff in a pan.

I'll reserve my comments about putting butter on rice for another day.

Ok, rice now on auto-pilot as well as the marinading chicken, I had an issue about what to do for a vegetable component. I had picked up green beans and broccoli (for me and Megan, respectively) but I didn't feel like steaming them or sauteeing them, and I hate boiled vegetables (not to mention they apparently remove vitamins, so why bother?), so I ran to the internet to do a quick search. I used a new tool I found called the Food Blog Search, which...well, searches food blogs, and came to a recipe for Roasted Green Beans with Onions and Walnuts. Ironically it was from a blog Jeni had previously suggested I check out, so I knew it was probably a good one.

Now, this one took a little improvising on my part; having not intended to make this side dish I was lacking in a few ingredients; I did happen to have a red onion lying around, but walnuts were a no go and I wasn't sure replacing them with peanuts would be the way to go (not to mention I didn't feel like unshelling said peanuts). I was also out of garlic cloves; I used the last of them in the chicken marinade. So I just used some garlic powder instead with a rough estimate as to how much would be about right. Another super-easy recipe: pre-heat to 450, oil the beans and onions slightly, make the "drizzle" and add at the end.

Cool.

So, oven is now pre-heating, it is now time for me and Mr. Grillpan to go for round three. Taking Matt's previously commented advice, I super-heated the sucker and pounded the chicken as flat as it would go prior to marinading. The beans took about 10 minutes so I put them in right before I threw my chicken on the pan for the suggested "3 and 3" round. Well, six minutes of filling my apartment with smoke later and...

...nope.

Still cooked the outside but not the inside. Inside was as raw as the day they slaughtered that bird. I suppose they're just too thick or that electric stoves and cast iron grillpans are simply not meant to replace a real grill. So, the grillpan and I are on speaking terms only as far as it concerns steaks and hamburgers, the only things it has managed to do correctly.

But! Not all was lost! The outside was beautifully lined and the skin nice and crisp. So, since my oven was already on at 450, I threw it in a 9x13 with a bit of oil and let it cook in there for about 10-12 more minutes. The beans came out in the meantime and the rice was on warm.

The result? Chicken was AMAZING using that process. The center was moist yet thoroughly cooked and the outside was crispy. The flavor was quite unique; the sugar put in a fair amount of sweetness, even enough to cover the usual super-salt intensity soy sauce tends to give recipes I use it with. All in all a success.

What was NOT a success however, was the lime dip. I don't know what Cambodians are like, but if they think that squeezing a lime into a bowl with salt and pepper is a legitimate sauce, then perhaps we shouldn't mix company often. I had a coughing fit the first time I tried it; super potent citrus combined with strong sea salt and added with admittedly too much pepper (I didn't count on the fact that peppercorns take up more volume and that the resulting crushing of those peppercorns would NOT equate to the same amount as using a tablespoon of already ground pepper) was just...gross.

But, since it was a dipping sauce, all was well. The beans were a fascinating mix as the two strongest flavors within it, the balsamic vinegar and the honey, interacted in a way I hadn't thought possible. Megan thought I cut the onions too thick, but other than that a totally successful meal.

I would give it a week-night doability if you're having a leisurely evening. I definitely need to try our public grill though, because this battle against the pan is getting old.


Wednesday - Italian Sausage and Bean Soup

Ingredients


1 lb Italian sausage. Use spicy Italian if you prefer.
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 clove garlic, minced
1 15oz can of great northern beans (white beans), rinsed and drained
1 15oz can of black beans, rinsed and drained
1-2 cans of beef broth (around 15 oz. We use low-sodium)
1 tbsp fresh basil or 1 teaspoon dried basil
Parmesan cheese for topping

The original recipe also called for a 1 15oz can of undrained tomatoes, but Megan doesn't like them so I took them out.

I also added crushed red pepper flakes...we'll talk about that in a second.


Ok! This is the most amazing recipe ever! It's a super-delicious stew-soup that is cheap to buy ingredients for (after buying bread for dipping, the cans of beans, the broth, and the sausage it was I think like 7 bucks) and takes like no time or skill to make!

Step 1: Brown sausage of choice. You can drain if you want, I didn't.
Step 2: Chop onion and garlic
Step 3: Rinse and drain beans
Step 4: Put all ingredients into pot.
Step 5: Simmer for 10 minutes
Step 6: Serve. Put cheese on top if you want.

Now, a few notes about personal preferences. Megan prefers a more thick stew and less soup, so her favorite is to use only one can of broth. I like more broth though, so I prefer to use two. I split this difference on Wednesday and used 1 1/2, and that seemed to make both of us happy.

In terms of spice, you can use a spicy italian sausage if you want. I decided to add pepper flakes to the sausage as I was browning them and I really liked it, but Megan found it too spicy. The first time I had this soup was during the Ing Annual Gingerbread House Making Extravaganza when my mom made it. At the time I added the pepper flakes in as I was eating it and got the same effect, so if you have different spice preferences you can always add more to your own personal bowl of soup as you go along.

I forgot the basil on Wednesday. I didn't really miss it though, so if you don't have any you can skip it and be fine.

The original recipe also only used 3/4 lb of sausage, but we like more meat.

Like I said, this is an AMAZING recipe. So delicious, reheats well, and take little time and effort. So you readers with babies might want to keep this handy for those particularly crazy nights.


That wraps it up for this week. Still no head way on the To-Try list, but since we were gone at the Young Married's retreat I didn't have time to do my Sunday Store Day (I don't intentionally try to alliterate my life, really I don't). But, I did learn a lot about cooking with alcohol from AJ and this other guy Dave, who apparently went to culinary school. So I think there will definitely be some new experiments coming up, along with delving into the list.

What'd you guys eat this week?