Chicken Tortilla Soup

When I wrote about the roasted chicken recently, I said that we would get several meals out of that one bird.  Well by my count, we have already had 4 or 5.  Once I just had the leftovers heated up in the oven.  But this time we actually used the chicken meat to make another dish.  This is a great way to make sure you're not wasting any of the food you cooked -- without getting bored eating the same thing over & over.

The Mrs actually cooked this one (which may not surprise anyone that may have picked up on her affinity toward soups).  She took the chicken meat and shredded it first.  Then you add the chicken along with the following ingredients to a large soup stock pot:

• 30 oz diced tomatoes
• 10 oz mild enchilada sauce
• 4 oz chopped mild green chiles
• 1 qt chicken broth
• 2 15-oz cans of black or pinto beans
• 10 oz frozen corn
• 1/2 medium onion, chopped
• 1 tbs chopped fresh cilantro
• 1 tsp cumin, chili powder, and salt
• 1/2 tsp black pepper

You should cook this on low for SEVERAL hours, or cook it on high for 2-3 hours.  You really want all the flavors to marry and develop that richness.  There is definitely some bite from the green chilis and the spices, some sweetness from the corn, and acidity from the tomatoes.   The chicken & beans provide a lot of protein.

This is a really fun soup.  I almost always like it when it's on a menu at a restaurant.  I believe this is the first time we have made it at home. Top it with some shredded cheese and either tortilla chips or crispy strips of tortilla.  You can also add a dollop of sour cream if you want.

Baked Rotini with Spinach & Mushrooms

This is another dish that I created in my head.  I decided to build some flavors in our Dutch oven and then finish the dish by baking it in the oven.  I started by getting some sausage browining along with Italian seasonings.  Then I diced a yellow onion, half of a green bell pepper, and maybe 2-3 cloves of fresh garlic.

Since it was turkey sausage, there wasn't that much grease in the pan, otherwise I would have drained a good portion of it.  Instead, I just tossed in my peppers, onion, and garlic and simmered the ingredients together until they had broken down and softened a little.

Next I dumped in a can of stewed tomatoes that I had drained and then chopped up.  At this point I also sliced button mushrooms and added them to the mix.  As you can see by this picture, it was a pretty chunky mixture.

Next up I added balsamic vinegar, red wine, crushed red peppers and a large can of tomato sauce.  I put the lid on the Dutch oven and let the mixture simmer away for a half hour.  Remember that you will want to taste this mixture while you're making your sauce to make sure everything is coming out to your liking.  You can add a little of this, a little of that, and develop the profile you're going for.  Once I was done, I had made enough sauce for my baked pasta dish as well as a larger mason jar to be used at a later date.

I grabbed a square casserole dish and half of a box of rotini noodles.  I also thawed and drained a package of frozen chopped spinach. I combined my sauce, the noodles, spinach, Parmesan & mozzarella cheeses, and uncooked rotini noodles and stirred everything together.  I topped it with some more cheese, covered it with tin foil, and baked at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.  Then I removed the foil and baked for an additional 5-10 minutes to get a nice golden color on the cheese mixture on top.

I deliberately put the noodles in uncooked because I wanted them to be a little al dente.  There is moisture in the sauce and vegetables to help cook the noodles while they were covered by the tin foil.  This came out a bit like a lasanga but with rotini rather than sheets of pasta.  I quite liked it, and I think I will have to save this recipe for the future.

Fresh Green Beans

As part of my efforts to incorporate more vegetables into my diet, I will sometimes grab a bag of these fresh green beans from the grocery store.  They're really cheap, and they are WAY better than those slimy green beans you get out of a can.  Much, much better.  They're also called string beans or snap beans.  But they're easy to cook, in fact I've even grilled them several times.

Some people like to snap the ends off these by hand – hence the name “snap beans”.  But I’m a much less patient guy.  We had a whole bag of these, and if I was going to take the time to snap each one by hand, it would have taken way too long for my taste.  So I grabbed them in bunches and lined them up on the cutting board.  Then I simply sliced off the ends.  I did it on both sides since I didn’t have every bean going in the same direction.  You really only need to remove the end with the long stem; but this way I knew I’d be covered.

Then in a larger non-stick pan, I got about 2 tbsp of margarine melting over medium heat.  You could certainly use butter here for the maximum flavor.  But I’m trying to keep these beans as healthy as possible.  So I used a Fleischmann’s margarine made with olive oil.  You could also just use olive oil here.  But I think the margarine gives it a little brighter color, and a richer flavor.

I threw in some dried minced onions along with the green beans.  This will add some nice onion flavor, and a little bit of something extra to the beans.  Then I seasoned them lightly with the garlic, onion powder, salt & pepper seasoning I described before. 

Now this is a great dish to practice that cool chefy technique of flipping vegetables in a sauce pan.  Grab the handle, angle it slightly downward away from you (maybe 20-degrees), and give it a quick snap upward and toward yourself.  You are bound to loose a few to spilling while you get this technique down.  But once you figure out how much of a snap-action to give the pan, you’ll have it down pat.  Obviously you could just stir the veggies around with a spoon or a spatula.  That might make your clean-up job a little easier … but it isn’t as much fun.

Let these simmer for maybe 12-14 minutes.  I can’t say the time for certain.  A lot will depend on the heat of your pan.  But I like the green beans to be cooked, but still have some crunch to them. 

They should get a little caramelization on them.  That’s why I prefer this method to just blanching them in some boiling water.

Roasted Chicken & Root Vegetables

This was another dish that my wife cooked up.  It is a pretty spot on representation of her cooking style.  She likes healthy meats.  Unlike me, she doesn't love cured meats, sausages, or really fatty cuts.  I like to call her a "meat surgeon" because she will meticulously remove all of the fat from a steak or a pork chop before she eats it.

She also likes vegetables.  That may seem like an obvious statement to you.  But when I was younger & single, I never really thought about eating vegetables.  I was basically a meat & potatoes kind of guy.  She makes a conscious effort to incorporate vegetables into her diet on a daily basis.  I think it's a great idea; and she has been a really good influence on my eating habits as a result.  For this dish she used beets, sweet potato, parsnips, red onion, garlic, and potato.

It was interesting to watch the high school cashier at the grocery store as she was ringing all this up.  We will often get looks, or even comments, about the fresh food we buy.  One woman even said "I want to come live with you guys."  Seriously.  Here's what all the veggies looked like all chopped up:

These vegetables just got a quick spray with the olive oil mister, and then some sea salt.  The vegetables were allowed to shine on their own.  But before those went into the oven, we had the bird.  Buying a whole chicken is really inexpensive.  I suspect that is because most people prefer their chicken boneless, skinless, and ready to go.  But if you're willing to get your hands a little dirty, this is a nice way to go.  We will probably get 3-4 meals out of one chicken.

Remove any organs inside the inner cavity.  Some people love these, we didn't use them.  Then the cavity was filled with garlic cloves, oregano, and salt.  Filling the inner cavity with seasonings will help to get more flavor into the bird.  The outside was given another "spritz" from the olive oil sprayer, and then we used a seasoning mix from my father-in-law.  This is the most simple seasoning mix we have; but it is really versitile. And it's good on almost anything.  It is quite simply garlic salt, onion powder, salt, and pepper.

Once the bird had been roasting for a while, we lifted the rack out of the baking dish, poured out any liquid that had drained out of the chicken, and filled the pan with the root vegetables.  This was my bright idea to free up some space in the oven to bake a loaf of bread.  But I also think it was a nice way to have that root vegetable flavor permeate through the chicken.

I have made my own bread a few times before.  But this is simply a Pillsbury loaf that you can buy next to the crescent rolls.  It turns out really nice:

As you can see from the first picture in this post, I like the dark meat.  I had some breast too.  But I have always been a sucker for the legs.  The Mrs. went for exclusively breast meat ... with only a little bit of skin.  The skin was crispy, salty, and delicious.  But she said she had to ration it because it isn't very good for you.

The house smelled great, we got a lot of vegetables, and we'll have delicious & moist chicken for several meals this week.  I think it was a great idea by my better half.  But of course, I already knew she had good taste. ;-)

Chicago-Style Deep Dish Pizza

This one is truly a treat.  For those of you native to the Midwest, hopefully you have been to a good deep dish pizzeria in Chicago at least once in your lives.  Many places outside Chicago will claim their pizzas are deep dish, or even go so far as to call them “Chicago-Style”, but then they’re little more than a Pizza Hut pan pizza.

There is a HUGE difference.  I was recently explaining it to a woman at my office.  Well, when I used to office downtown I ate probably 3 times each week at Charlie’s Pizzeria.  Sadly that restaurant was destroyed in the floods of 2008 and never reopened.  But I was lucky enough to become good friends with the owner.  She was back in town this week and was kind enough to send a Chicago-style pizza home with me to bake in our home oven so The Mrs. could sample what I’ve been raving about for years.

And to set the record straight: my friend’s restaurant was family owned for 3 generations.  Her grandfather originally won the recipe off a cook from Lou Malnati’s in Chicago in a hand of poker.  I know that sounds made up; but it isn’t!  She has personally also visited the kitchens of Gino’s East, Giordano’s, and Pizzeria Uno to learn their secrets.  So when she calls it “Chicago-Style” … it really is.

There was an episode of No Reservations where Anthony Bourdain was attempting to settle the age old NY vs. Chicago styles of pizza.  He ultimately said, “Whatever that is, it isn’t pizza.  But it is delicious.”

Chicago-style pizza really is a pizza pie.  It uses a super deep dish pan and layers the toppings so that my end result weighed around 5 pounds.  The crust is buttery and flaky and really does almost resemble a pie dough.

You start by layering the cheese slices on the bottom.  I asked why you would do this, and she told me it’s because you bake the pie for so long at such a hot temperature, that it would burn the cheese otherwise.  That’s why the sauce is on top.

Then you can pile on any number of your favorite pizza toppings, top it with a delicious sweet sauce containing crushed & stewed tomatoes, and sprinkle some Parmesean cheese on top. 

You can bake this in your home oven at 450-degrees for 30 minutes.  Then prepare to be blown away.  Two slices will fill you up, and three sends you over the edge.  It’s that filling.

I can’t take any credit for this dish at all.  But I can at least take credit for having the good sense to make Shadia my friend all those years ago.  And I’m glad for that.

Cajun-Style Dirty Rice

My dad and I have talked a few times about how we find new recipes.  I probably have 8 cookbooks in our kitchen right now; and I'll also go to the internet to find recipes.  What we like to do is compare several different recipes for the same dish.  You will find that the core ingredients are often the same across the board, but then each recipe will add their own little touch.  We like to pick out the things that appeal most to us, and then add them to the basic recipe.

That's what I did for this dirty rice dish.  Typically you would start with the Creole holy trinity of bell pepper, onion, and celery ... but I didn't have any bell peppers in the house, so I used a mire poix instead.  I also diced up some turkey polish sausage and sauteed them all together in some olive oil.  Most sausages have enough fat that you wouldn't need any oil.  But turkey is leaner so I used a little oil to make sure everything wasn't sticking to the pan.

Then I added a little salt & pepper.  You may not need salt if you have a different kind of sausage here.  But I wanted to bring out some of the moisture in the onions.  Next I added Cajun seasoning and parsley.  

After everything had been breaking down in the pan, and the meat was getting a nice caramely crust, I added 2 tbsp of tomato paste and some hot sauce.  That was my own personal touch here.  I thought it would lend a nice color to everything, and add another flavor profile to the dish.

In the meantime I made some instant brown rice.  When that was almost finished cooking, I poured it into the skillet and finished cooking it with the simmering meat & veggies.  I topped the whole thing with some green onions for a little crunch and some bite.

I made sure to make enough to have some leftover for a lunch later in the week.  I'm glad I did.  Because I really like it.  And I'm a sucker for anything with polish sausage.

Green Tomato Chutney

The drought and near-record temperatures this summer didn't do wonders for our first garden.  Our cucumbers, zucchini  herbs, and peppers all were total busts.  We did have our cherry tomato plants ultimately produce toward the end of the summer.  But this weekend as we were weeding and raking and preparing for the change in weather, there were tons of unripe tomatoes still on the vines.

I searched the internet and found a recipe for tomato chutney using unripe tomatoes.  My thrifty nature jumped all over this idea.  Plus, this blog has forced me to try new things.  Add those two things together, and you've got a Midwestern guy making chutney!

This process was pretty painless.  Pick off the stems from all the tomatoes and cut them into smaller pieces.  If you have full-sized green tomatoes, you will also want to cut out the white core.  Then in a saucepan add the following:

• 1 pound green tomatoes, chopped
• 1/2 medium white onion, chopped
• 1/2 cup golden raisins
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly grated ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon ground allspice*
• 1/8 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup apple cider vinegar

 *If you don't have allspice, you can use equal parts nutmeg, cinnamon, and cloves.  That's what I did.  Cover and let this simmer for 30 minutes.  Remove the lid and let it cool.  Then put it into a jar and refrigerate.

It's quite tasty, I must say.  I immediately tried it on some toast.  But you can use it in any number of applications.  Many times people will use it to top a piece of chicken or other roasted meats.  But you could also use it as a condiment for quesadillas or even hot dogs.

It is sweet from the brown sugar, acidic from the green tomatoes, and floral from the spices.  It's hard to describe.  But I would say it's worth a shot.  It's a heck of a lot better than just letting all those green tomatoes go to waste!