Well, this will be my last new recipe for a while...next week I am having surgery and who knows how long I'll be off my feet? I am thankful for the ladies of my church who will be bringing meals, it is a huge blessing. Hopefully only a couple of weeks before I'm back in the kitchen...anyway this recipe is from the Betty Crocker cookbook I mentioned a couple of posts ago. We had this Friday night with our homies Brad & Autumn. It's always risky making something new when you have people over, but I knew a whole chicken would be too much for the Pages to eat alone, and I really wanted to have them over, since the amount of time I have been working really cuts into my social life. Ha ha.
Chicken-Potato Roast
3-3 1/2 pound broiler-fryer chicken (mine was like 5.5 lbs)
1 medium apple, cut into fourths
1 medium onion, cut into fourths
2 cloves garlic, cut into fourths
6 medium baking potatoes
2 tbsp butter, melted
1 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp salt
Heat oven to 375. Fold wings of chicken across back with tips touching. Place apple, onion, and garlic in body cavity. Tie or skewer drumsticks to tail (I didn't have any twine or skewers. On the advice of my sister, I bound the drumsticks together with a never-been-used hair elastic. It worked great but looked funny). Place chicken, breast side up (I accidentally did breast side down, oops), on rack in shallow roasting pan. Cut potatoes crosswise into 1/4-inch slices about 3/4 of the way through. Place on rack around chicken. Mix remaining ingredients; brush over chicken and potatoes. Roast uncovered 1 to 1 1/4 hours (like 25 minutes per pound of chicken), brushing chicken and potatoes with butter mixture every 30 minutes, until juices of chicken run clear and potatoes are tender (meat thermometer should read 170). (I should note here that I had no basting juices. Maybe because the chicken was upside down? I don't know. But since my chicken was bigger, I kept it covered the first 90 minutes or so, then uncovered it for the last hour. It was golden brown and delicious looking. Until Steve had to flip it over to "carve" it. Then it looked not as nice, oh well.) Let chicken stand 10 minutes before carving; keep potatoes warm. Discard apple, onion, and garlic. Remove and discard chicken skin (they tell you to do this in an effort to make this recipe healthier, because the skin is REALLY fatty. But you can do what you want. If you like chicken skin just leave it on there).
So this chicken turned out quite nice. It smelled great, due to the garlic and onion. I thought the potatoes were very dry, but people still ate them. Also I couldn't get the stuff out of the "cavity" if you know what I mean. So it stayed in there. Again this was probably due to the fact that I put the chicken in upside down. I thought I was doing it right. I'm a nurse for goodness sake, I should be able to tell the top side of chicken. Oh well, I don't work with chickens, I work with people, so I guess it's okay. But I did feel silly as Steve was giving me a chicken anatomy lesson when he discovered he had to flip it over. Overall I would say the fellowship was better than the meal, but the meal was a good reason to get together to fellowship, know what I mean??
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Thursday, April 8, 2010
BBQ Chicken Sandwiches
This one is again from the crock pot cookbook I got for Christmas. After having such large quantities the last few recipes I tried, I decided to halve this recipe so I didn't have a ton of leftovers. I will give you the recipe in it's regular format, which according to this, serves 12-14.
BBQ Chicken Sandwiches
4 pounds boneless skinless chicken thighs
1 tsp celery salt
1 tsp seasoned salt
1/2 tsp pepper
2 onions, chopped
6 garlic cloves, minced
1 18 oz bottle barbecue sauce (I always use Sweet Baby Ray's--so good)
1 6 oz can tomato paste
1/4 cup honey
1 tsp dried Italian seasoning
12-14 sandwich rolls
Sprinkle chicken with celery salt, seasoned salt, and pepper. Place onions in bottom of 5-6 quart slow cooker and top with chicken and garlic. In medium bowl, combine barbecue sauce, tomato paste, honey, and Italian seasoning; mix well. Pour over chicken. Cover and cook on low 8-9 hours or until chicken is cooked. Using two forks, shred chicken in the sauce. Serve on split and toasted sandwich rolls.
Sam was very excited about this. He thought they were sloppy joes, and he continued to be excited and think that through the meal, so I just let him think that. It's just semantics anyway, right? A rose by any other name and all that. Steve loved it. I thought it was okay. The sauce had a tang to it that I wasn't sure about. But overall a good meal. We had it with frozen french fries (which I cooked) and green beans.
BBQ Chicken Sandwiches
4 pounds boneless skinless chicken thighs
1 tsp celery salt
1 tsp seasoned salt
1/2 tsp pepper
2 onions, chopped
6 garlic cloves, minced
1 18 oz bottle barbecue sauce (I always use Sweet Baby Ray's--so good)
1 6 oz can tomato paste
1/4 cup honey
1 tsp dried Italian seasoning
12-14 sandwich rolls
Sprinkle chicken with celery salt, seasoned salt, and pepper. Place onions in bottom of 5-6 quart slow cooker and top with chicken and garlic. In medium bowl, combine barbecue sauce, tomato paste, honey, and Italian seasoning; mix well. Pour over chicken. Cover and cook on low 8-9 hours or until chicken is cooked. Using two forks, shred chicken in the sauce. Serve on split and toasted sandwich rolls.
Sam was very excited about this. He thought they were sloppy joes, and he continued to be excited and think that through the meal, so I just let him think that. It's just semantics anyway, right? A rose by any other name and all that. Steve loved it. I thought it was okay. The sauce had a tang to it that I wasn't sure about. But overall a good meal. We had it with frozen french fries (which I cooked) and green beans.
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Chai Tea Surprise
I meant to post this a few months ago. In fact, I thought I had already posted it, until Autumn told me she was looking for it and didn't see it. Autumn had a Tupperware party back in January, with the fabulous consultant Rebecca Coffin. She made this tea in the crockpot, with hilarious results, hence my main reason for posting. So this is Autumn's recipe, she said she got it out of a cookbook I would like, but I can't remember anything else about it. I think she either doubled or tripled the recipe for the party but I can't remember. It doesn't seem like 4 cups of milk would go very far.
Chai Tea (Surprise!)
4 cups milk
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 Tbls sugar
4 cinnamon sticks (or 2 tsp ground cinnamon)
4 cardamom pods
4 tea bags (black tea)
Use a 4 quart slow cooker. Put milk into the stoneware and stir in the spices, vanilla and sugar. Float the cinnamon sticks, cardamom pods, and tea bags on top. Cover and cook on high for 2 hours or until heated through.
Okay here's what the recipe DOESN'T tell you to do: when to remove the tea bags. So Autumn didn't know to remove them. She thought, as would any person in this situation, that the tea would stay nicely in the bags. Unfortunately, whether it was the prolonged exposure to heat or some other factor, the tea bags disintegrated. How did we discover this? Well, Aura & Amy got the first mugs of it. I watched them using the ladle to scoop the tea into their mugs. I saw some chunks plop into the mug and thought, "well, I'm not drinking that." And drank Diet Pepsi, as per my usual routine. Aura is very naturalistic, and eats and drinks all kinds of things that are good for you, even if they don't taste that good, so she was not alarmed by the chunks in the tea. By the time everyone left, Autumn was like "oh, I never tried any of the tea. Becky, do you want some Chai Tea?" Becky said that sure, she would try it. She asked me, too, but I, having seen the aforementioned chunks, was not at all interested. No thanks, I said. Autumn ladles the tea into the mugs. She sees the chunks. She wonders aloud, "what is that?" It looked like cat hair. But it couldn't be, they don't have a cat because B Rad is allergic. Then Brad asked, "is it the tea bags?" Poor Autumn. Realization dawned. It was the dang tea bags. She went back to the recipe, and confirmed that nowhere does it say to remove them. We all laughed so hard that we cried and replayed it over and over, such as the looks on people's faces when they drank, the way they had to use their teeth as strainers to drink the tea, and so on. I asked if I could post it on New Recipe Night and she consented. What a flipping riot. If any of you want to try this one, you should. We can't even tell you the underlying flavor of the tea, because the taste of the tea bags was too overpowering. So try it for yourself, and remove the tea bags before your guests come. HA!
Chai Tea (Surprise!)
4 cups milk
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 Tbls sugar
4 cinnamon sticks (or 2 tsp ground cinnamon)
4 cardamom pods
4 tea bags (black tea)
Use a 4 quart slow cooker. Put milk into the stoneware and stir in the spices, vanilla and sugar. Float the cinnamon sticks, cardamom pods, and tea bags on top. Cover and cook on high for 2 hours or until heated through.
Okay here's what the recipe DOESN'T tell you to do: when to remove the tea bags. So Autumn didn't know to remove them. She thought, as would any person in this situation, that the tea would stay nicely in the bags. Unfortunately, whether it was the prolonged exposure to heat or some other factor, the tea bags disintegrated. How did we discover this? Well, Aura & Amy got the first mugs of it. I watched them using the ladle to scoop the tea into their mugs. I saw some chunks plop into the mug and thought, "well, I'm not drinking that." And drank Diet Pepsi, as per my usual routine. Aura is very naturalistic, and eats and drinks all kinds of things that are good for you, even if they don't taste that good, so she was not alarmed by the chunks in the tea. By the time everyone left, Autumn was like "oh, I never tried any of the tea. Becky, do you want some Chai Tea?" Becky said that sure, she would try it. She asked me, too, but I, having seen the aforementioned chunks, was not at all interested. No thanks, I said. Autumn ladles the tea into the mugs. She sees the chunks. She wonders aloud, "what is that?" It looked like cat hair. But it couldn't be, they don't have a cat because B Rad is allergic. Then Brad asked, "is it the tea bags?" Poor Autumn. Realization dawned. It was the dang tea bags. She went back to the recipe, and confirmed that nowhere does it say to remove them. We all laughed so hard that we cried and replayed it over and over, such as the looks on people's faces when they drank, the way they had to use their teeth as strainers to drink the tea, and so on. I asked if I could post it on New Recipe Night and she consented. What a flipping riot. If any of you want to try this one, you should. We can't even tell you the underlying flavor of the tea, because the taste of the tea bags was too overpowering. So try it for yourself, and remove the tea bags before your guests come. HA!
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