When in doubt, serve it on arugula!

I love my kitchen as much as the next food blogger. I feel very comfortable there. It’s normally very relaxing for me to cook.

But sometimes I just want dinner to be made. I want a dish that’s quick, flavorful, and simple.

I want a dish that I can make within the time it takes me to listen to one podcast of Car Talk.

This dish is that dish.

It can look a bit intimidating, especially if you aren’t use to cooking with a lot of Asian flavors. But really it’s dumb simple to make and utilizes one of my favorite kitchen tips!

Sesame Chicken Noodle Salad

Yield: Serves 4.

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 35 minutes

Ingredients:

1 pound chicken breasts, seasoned with salt and pepper
1 red pepper, sliced
1 pound linguine
Vegetable oil
Arugula

Sesame Sauce:
2 inches fresh ginger, peeled and diced
1/3 cup peanut butter
1/3 cup rice wine vinegar
1/4 cup oyster sauce
1 tablespoon chili-garlic sauce
2 tablespoons sesame oil
1/2 cup pasta water (from linguine)

Directions:

1) Season chicken with salt and pepper. Add a drizzle of vegetable oil to a large skillet and heat over medium-high heat.

2) Sear chicken on both sides for about 4 minutes, then turn down heat and continue to cook chicken, flipping occasionally, until chicken is cooked through, about 12 minutes total cooking time.

3) Remove chicken from pan and slice into large chunks.

4) Start cooking pasta. When pasta is almost done, scoop out some pasta water.

5) Mix sauce ingredients in a bowl. Stir well. The sauce should be very smooth and silky. If it's very thick, add more pasta water.

6) Using same pan that you cooked the chicken in, add another drizzle of oil and add red peppers. Cook for just a few minutes over medium-high heat until veggies soften.

7) Add diced chicken back to skillet and stir in sesame sauce.

8) Drain pasta and add to skillet. Stir together to incorporate everything.

9) Serve sesame chicken salad on a bed of arugula.

Heavily adapted from a Cook's Country recipe.

The Sesame Sauce

When I say this meal can be intimidating, it’s mostly because I’m not sure a lot of people keep their pantries stocked with the stuff to make this sauce.

If you have to buy this stuff for the first time, it’ll involve lots of words you probably can’t pronounce and at least one panda bear.

Lots of jars...

Have no fear though. Once you hunt down all the jars that you need, the only actual work you need to do for the sauce besides measuring is peeling and dicing some ginger. Not rocket science!

There is one problem though. When you mix all these ingredients together, it will taste very good, but it’ll most likely be a bit on the lumpy side.

Don’t worry about this right now. We’ll fix it later!

A bit chunky...

The Chicken

The sauce is definitely the star of this show. You don’t have to use chicken for this dish if you wanted to make a vegetarian version. You could just toss the sauce with the noodles or use some seared tofu if you wanted.

I went the chicken route on this day though. Assuming you are using chicken, just season a few boneless skinless breasts with a good pinch of salt and pepper. I’m usually not a huge boneless skinless chicken fan, but it works well for this recipe.

Keep it simple.

In a large skillet, heat a drizzle of oil over medium high heat and once the pan is hot, add the chicken.

Sear the chicken for about 4 minutes per side. Then turn down the heat to medium and continue to cook until the chicken is cooked through, probably another 6 minutes or so. That of course will depend on how big your chicken breasts are.

Mine were on the smaller side.

Make sure it's cooked through...

Once the chicken is cooked through, scoop it out of the pan and slice it into big chunks.

You want the chicken to be visible in the final dish!

Big chunks work great.

Finishing the Dish

There’s just a few other things you’ll need to finish off this recipe. While it’s kind of optional, I recommend dicing up a red pepper and also getting some arugula ready.

Two quick veggies.

When it comes to the pasta for the dish, you can use almost any thin pasta. Spaghetti, linguine, angel hair… it would all work fine.

Fantastic Kitchen Tip Alert

Anytime you are making a sauce to go with pasta, one of the best sauce helpers you can have is the actual water that you cook the pasta in. Pasta water is starchy and salty and will help smooth out sauces and give them some body.

If you ever find yourself with a lumpy or lackluster sauce, try adding some pasta water to it.

In this case, we will add about 1/2 cup to that lumpy sauce that we mixed together earlier.

Wonderful water.

This will completely smooth out the sauce and make it perfect.

In the same skillet that you used to cook the chicken (no need to wash it even), add another drizzle of oil and then toss in your red peppers.

Cook them for a few minutes until they are soft and then add in your chicken. Pour your sauce over the whole thing!

Sauce is really smooth now.

Assuming you are decent at timing, hopefully your pasta is done as well right around this time.

Almost any pasta will work.

Then just stir your pasta in with the chicken and sauce.

It’ll look like a lot of sauce, but it’s just enough to coat all the stuff.

If at any point, the sauce gets too thick, just add a bit more pasta water to it and it’ll thin out.

This was my finished version!

All tossed together!

Now, you could just serve this in a big bowl, but I tried something a bit unconventional.

I served mine on arugula. This might sound strange to serve a pasta dish on greens, but it worked really well actually. The arugula is nice and peppery and holds up well to the strong sesame flavors.

And it makes for a pretty plate!

Pretty plate!

So there ya go!

If you can master the sauce, this dish is really simple to throw together, but really delivers in the flavor department.

Give it a shot if you’re in the market for a quick and easy dinner. And let’s be real… who isn’t in the market for a quick and easy dinner?

First gumbo is a good one.

I’ve had gumbo on my list of recipes to try out for over a year now. There’s one main reason why I haven’t made it until now: Gumbo snobs.

Yep. You read that right. I’ve discovered that people who make gumbo are very… um… opinionated. There’s one way to do it and it’s their way.

Of course, the reality of it is that there are a bunch of different ways to make gumbo. It can have seafood, sausage, chicken, or just veggies. It can use a dark or light roux made from oil or butter. It should probably be served over rice, but I’m sure there are other options.

So let’s just get this out of the way: This is one way to make gumbo. I’m not sure if it’s the best, but it’s damn good.

If you have issues with it, please take it up with Bettyjean, the creator of the recipe. Who’s Bettyjean you might ask? I have no idea.

A friend (Hi Jess!) let me borrow a cookbook to browse through called Old Biloxi Recipes and this was the recipe that caught my eye. The book is basically a collection of really wonderful recipes that have been handed down generation to generation. Some of the recipes don’t even have amounts. It’ll just say stuff like “Carrots” or “Celery”, but you can figure it out.

Anyway, Bettyjean apparently let them publish her gumbo recipe and I’m glad she did. I made a few changes to it, but nothing major.

Bettyjean's Chicken Gumbo

Yield: Serves 8.

Prep Time: 1 hour

Total Time: 4 hours

Ingredients:

Stock:
1 whole chicken or 3 pounds pieces with bones
2 onions, quartered
2 carrots, quartered
3 stalks celery, quartered
20-30 black peppercorns
1 head garlic, halved
A handful of parsley stalks

Roux:
1 cup peanut oil
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

Finished Gumbo:
1 large sweet onion, diced
1 bell pepper, diced
3 stalks celery, diced
6-8 scallions, diced (reserve green parts for garnish)
1/2 cup white wine
Hot sauce
Long grain white rice
File powder
1 pound sausage (andouille is best), sliced and browned (opt.)

Directions:

1) Add stock ingredients to a large pot with enough water to cover everything, 8-10 cups. Bring to a simmer and simmer on low, covered, for at least 2 hours.

2) Remove chicken pieces from stock. Remove skin from chicken and shred the pieces into large chunks. Strain the stock.

3) Add stock and chicken back to large pot.

4) To make roux, stir oil and flour together over medium-low heat until it turns a nice dark color. The lightest it should be is the color of peanut butter, but you can go much dark. Stir regularly while it's cooking so it doesn't burn. It will take at least 20 minutes to get to the right shade.

5) Dice up onions, bell peppers, and celery for finishing ingredients. Split into two piles.

6) Add one pile of diced veggies to the roux when it's the shade you want. That will stop the cooking process for the roux. Stir together veggies and roux.

7) Saute the second pile of veggies in a skillet over medium-high heat with a drizzle of olive oil and a pinch of salt. Cook until softened, about 4-5 minutes.

8) Bring stock and chicken to a simmer and start adding roux mixture to it. Add it in large spoonfuls and make sure it dissolves completely before adding more. It'll take 5-10 minutes to add all the roux to the stock. Continue to simmer for 20 minutes uncovered to thicken the mixture. If you're using browned sausage (like andouille) add it now.

9) Add sauteed veggies to gumbo and white wine. Season with hot sauce and salt and pepper.

10) Serve gumbo over rice sprinkled with file powder. Garnish with scallion greens.

Adapted from the Old Biloxi Recipes book.

Starting with Stock

I got into a brief comment debate recently on an old post about how I’m a hypocrite. Basically, I talk a lot about how people should make their own stock and stuff and then I sometimes use store-bought stock.

This is true. At the end of the day, I’m a human being and try to have a life outside of the kitchen. Even when I do use store-bought stock though, I’m well aware that there’s a better way to do it. I don’t kid myself.

But when I do have time, I always try to make my stock. This is especially true for soups (although Macheesmo detectives will be able to find examples of soups on the site that I used store-bought stock to make).

This is really especially true though when the soup involves chicken because you have to cook the chicken anyway so it’s not a too much extra work to just make stock at the same time.

Taking stock.

For this recipe, you can either use a whole chicken or about 3-4 pounds of chicken pieces. Whatever you do, don’t make stock out of boneless skinless chicken breasts. There will be no flavor!

You need bones and skin to make your stock. So if you’re doing pieces (which I did for this version), use some thighs or legs and make sure to get breasts with the bone in.

Then just add everything to a large pot and bring it to a simmer.

This will smell great in an hour.

Let this simmer, covered, for at least two hours. The longer you go, the deeper your stock will be. Two hours is the absolute minimum.

When you’re happy with it, remove the chicken pieces and let them cool. Then strain the stock you’ll have a nice dark chicken stock that will smell delicious.

The real stuff.

Once your chicken is cool enough to handle, remove the skin from the pieces and shred the chicken into large pieces. Then add the chicken back to the pot with all the stock. You should have about 8 cups of stock here. If you have less, then add water or a good store-bought stock to make up the difference.

Chicken and stock.

The Roux

I make a lot of roux for recipes. Most importantly, it’s how I make queso dip. The roux for gumbo though is a much different beast although the idea is the same. Basically, it’s just fat and flour, cooked together and used to thicken something.

Instead of butter though, I used peanut oil. You also need much more of it and it’s good to get it much darker than when you’re making a light cream sauce.

Just two ingredients.

Add your oil and flour to a medium pot and get it cooking over medium heat. Stir it frequently while it cooks to make sure it doesn’t burn.

After 15-20 minutes, it’ll resemble the color of peanut butter. This is about as light as you can go for gumbo. You could stop here if you wanted and proceed with the recipe.

You could stop here.

Generally though, you’ll get a more flavorful gumbo if you continue to cook your roux for another 5-10 minutes so it gets really dark.

Like I said, this was my first gumbo so I wasn’t sure exactly how far you could go before burning the flour, but I got mine a few shades darker before deciding it was done. You might be able to go even darker, but this was the stage I stopped at and it made for a great gumbo.

You could maybe even go darker.

It’s really important to stop the cooking of the roux when it reaches the color you want. It could keep cooking and possibly burn.

The easiest way to stop the cooking is to stir in about half of the finishing veggies that you’ll need for the finished gumbo. Stir these in and it’ll stop the roux from cooking and actually cook the veggies a bit at the same time.

Stop that cooking!

Finishing the Gumbo

The gumbo is really easy to finish at this point.

Take your other half of the finishing veggies (onions, scallions, pepper, celery) and saute them on medium in a drizzle of oil until they are soft. You don’t want them browned, just soft. This will bring out some of the sweet flavors of the veggies.

Just 4-5 minutes of cooking should do the trick.

More veggies.

Bring your stock and chicken mixture back to a simmer and slowly start adding your roux to the stock in large spoonfuls. Make sure each spoonful gets dissolved before adding more.

Once all your roux is incorporated into the stock, let the gumbo simmer for 20 minutes or so to thicken up. Then add in the sauteed veggies, white wine, and sausage if you’re using it. Brown the sausage and slice it up before adding it to the gumbo.

Season the gumbo with hot sauce and salt and pepper. It’s really important to taste it and adjust the seasoning. I probably added 2-3 tablespoons of hot sauce to mine and a few big pinches of salt and pepper.

Don't forget to taste and season.

Serving Gumbo

While there is a lot of different ways to make gumbo, I’m not sure how many different ways you can serve the stuff. It’s really made for rice.

I just used normal long grain white rice and sprinkled on some gumbo file which gives the finished dish a very distinct gumbo flavor. I think this stuff is worth ordering if you want your gumbo to taste authentic, but you could definitely forego it and still have a pretty good meal.

Good stuff.

I garnished my gumbo with some of the greens from the scallions.

This was a really great winter meal.

Really good!

Besides being delicious, this also makes a metric ton of gumbo. Betsy and I ate it for multiple meals. It would also freeze really well if you wanted to keep it for longer than a week.

The next time I make it, I do think I’ll try adding some sausage to it, but I was pretty happy with this as my first gumbo attempt.

Ok. What did I miss?

People who know gumbo – leave a comment with tips/suggestions/etc.

Best risotto I've made

This might not be a surprise to you but I think that most restaurant meals are a tad bit overpriced.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy to pay for a really delicious meal, but some restaurants get away with charging high prices for meals because people have a perception of the dish being very hard to make at home.

I think risotto is pretty much the perfect example of this. I mean, risotto is a poor man’s meal. It’s rice. And stock. Nothing fancy. The only reason why it’s expensive is because there’s a perception that it’s a difficult dish.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen risotto in a restaurant for less than $15 and most are above $20.

You can buy a lot of rice for $20, people.

And I have better news for you. The concept that risotto is hard to make is a myth. It’s really not. You can do it. I promise. And while you’re making it, you can also fold in some delicious persimmons. If you do this, you’ll be left with a big pot of some of the best risotto I’ve ever eaten.

Persimmon Risotto

Yield: Serves 4.

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 50 minutes

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups arborio rice
1/4 cup shallots
1/3 cup white wine
1 1/2 quarts chicken stock
2 persimmons, peeled and chopped
1/2 lemon, juice only
3 tablespoons olive oil
Pomegranate seeds
Salt and pepper
Seared Chicken breasts (opt.)

Directions:

1) Peel and dice persimmons. Dice shallots. Toss chicken breasts with some olive oil and season well with salt and pepper.

2) Heat chicken stock in a large pot until it's simmering.

3) In a large, high-sided pan, add a drizzle of olive oil over high heat. Once it's hot, add chicken breasts, skin side down. Sear for 5 minutes on each side.

4) Transfer seared chicken breasts to an oven-safe dish and bake in the oven at 350 degrees for 30 minutes until they are cooked through.

5) In the same pan that you used to sear the chicken, add some fresh olive oil and the shallots. Cook for a minute or two over medium high heat until shallots soften. Try to scrape up any bits stuck to the pan.

6) Add rice and continue to cook for a minute or two.

7) Add white wine and continue to cook. At this point you should be able to easily scrape up any bits stuck to the pan.

8) Once white wine is cooked off, ladle in warm chicken stock. Add about 3/4 cup of stock at a time and stir risotto as it cooks over medium heat.

9) When pan is dry, ladle in more stock. Continue doing this until the risotto is soft but still has a tiny bite to it. This will probably take between 4-5 cups of stock and about 25-30 minutes.

10) When risotto is desired texture, season with salt and pepper and stir in chopped persimmons.

11) To remove pomegranate seeds, cut the pomegranate into quarters and break apart the quarters submerged in a bowl of water. The seeds will sink.

12) Serve risotto with chicken and sprinkled with pomegranate seeds.

Persi-what?

Persimmons are a strange fruit. They look kind of like tomatoes, but are much firmer. They are seasonally available in the winter (Nov-Feb normally) and can add a slight sweet flavor to dishes. They are actually really mild though so don’t be afraid to use a lot of them in something flavorful like risotto.

Strange tomatoes...

The important part about persimmons is that their skin is really tough. It’s not like tomato skin even though it looks like. You definitely want to peel these guys before using them.

Once they are peeled you can just dice up the fruit and set it aside for later.

Gotta peel these guys.

Some Protein

The finished risotto is pretty hearty and can definitely be served on its own. You can make it with vegetable stock and make it vegetarian even.

To make it a full dinner though, I decided to sear some chicken and serve it on top of the risotto.

I just tossed a few chicken breasts (bone-in and skin-on) with some olive oil and salt and pepper. Then I seared them on high heat in the same pan that I used for my risotto.

I just cooked the chicken breasts for about 5 minutes skin side down. Then I transferred the chicken to an oven-safe dish and finished them off in a 350 degree oven for about 30 minutes.

Finished in the oven...

The nice thing about this is that searing the chicken in the pan leaves some great flavors in the pan that we can use for our risotto.

Making the Risotto

Before you can really start cooking the risotto, add your stock to a large pan and bring it to a very light simmer. Adding hot stock to the risotto will make the cooking process a lot faster.

Once your stock is hot, start the risotto by adding a drizzle of fresh olive oil to the pan that you seared the chicken in (don’t wash the pan). Then toss in the shallots and cook them for a few minutes over medium-high heat until they are soft but not browned.

Lots of flavor already.

Then add in your rice. Obviously this will be very dry, but it’s important to heat the rice before you start to add liquid so the grains open up.

Risotto is easy.

Once the rice and shallots cook for a minute or two, add in the white wine. It’ll hiss and sizzle and complain, but use the liquid from the white wine to lift any bits of chicken that might be stuck to the pan from the earlier searing.

The white wine will be gone in no time and then you’re ready to start adding your hot chicken stock.

Ready for stock!

The “Hard” Part

The next part is the part that people think makes risotto difficult. Basically, you need to ladle in small batches (about 3/4 cup at a time) of the hot stock and stir it into the rice until the rice is cooked.

This could take anywhere from 25-35 minutes and probably use 4-5 cups of stock.

Traditionally, you are supposed to never stop stirring the risotto while it cooks, but I don’t really do that and my risotto always turns out fine. I just ladle in some stock, stir the risotto so the liquid distributes, then I walk away for a minute or two if I need to.

You don’t need to stir constantly, but you do need to keep a close eye on it because if it gets dry you need to immediately add more stock to the pan or the risotto could burn.

That’s really all there is to it: Stock. Stir. Repeat.

This was my finished risotto. The finished version is rich and creamy and the grains should still have a very tiny bite to them. They shouldn’t be mushy.

Almost there...

Finishing the Dish

When the risotto is cooked, go ahead and add in all those chopped persimmons and a dash of fresh lemon juice.

Stir this all together and season it with a bit of salt and pepper and your risotto is done!

Nice color.

The Pom Seeds

I wanted to add on a fun and colorful garnish to this dish and pomegranate seeds seemed like the perfect choice. They are a bit crunchy which adds a nice texture and the have a strong flavor that I thought would go well with the creamy risotto.

Of course, the problem is how to do you get all those seeds out of the pomegranate?!

So good.

It’s really easy actually. Just quarter the pomegranate and then submerge each quarter in a large bowl of water. While the pomegranate is underwater, use your fingers to break up the seeds. The seeds will sink and all of the white pith parts will float. Then you can just drain the seeds and you’re ready to go!

Like I said, you can serve the risotto by itself like I did in the first photo or serve it with the seared chicken.

$25. At least.

Betsy and I both agreed that this was the best risotto I’ve ever made. Just delicious.

I would charge at least $25 for this at my imaginary restaurant.

But you wouldn’t pay that much, of course, because now you can make it for yourself!

This warms the soul.

It’s been a very long time since I’ve posted something made in my crockpot, almost two years in fact. So I was very happy when a crockpot dish won the poll last week.

Plus, it just makes sense. It’s cold and you’re probably busy this time of year so a dish that you can RONCO (set it and forget it) is probably helpful.

Funnily, this soup fits almost all of the categories in the poll last week. I swear that wasn’t planned… sometimes it just works out that way.

I’ve made chicken tortilla soup before, but never posted on it. This version was, by far, the best version I’ve ever made though. Something about letting the flavors just kind of mingle all day long really gave the finished soup an interesting and deep flavor.

You’d be silly not to try this!

Crockpot Chicken Tortilla Soup

Yield: Serves 5-6

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 8 hours

Ingredients:

1 yellow onion, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 Serrano pepper, diced (with seeds)
1 red pepper, diced
1 stalk celery, diced
1 chipotle pepper, minced
1 15 ounce can diced tomatoes
1 pound chicken breasts
2 dried New Mexico chile peppers (or poblano)
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
2 bay leaves
6 cups chicken stock
A few sprigs cilantro
3 corn tortillas, diced
1 cup corn
Salt and pepper

Garnish:
Corn tortilla strips
Avocados
Limes
Cotija cheese
Sour cream

Helpful Equipment:
Crockpot

Directions:

1) Finely dice the onion, garlic, peppers, and celery and add them to a crockpot.

2) Also add in the chicken breasts, canned tomatoes, bay leaves, cumin seeds, dried chiles, and chicken stock. The stock should just cover all the ingredients.

3) Cover and set the crockpot on low. Cook for 6-8 hours.

4) Remove dried chiles and bay leaves and discard. Remove chicken breasts, shred, and return to crockpot.

5) Add in cilantro sprigs, corn, and a few corn tortillas cut into bits. Let the crockpot simmer for another 30-60 minutes.

6) Season soup with salt and pepper.

7) To make tortilla strips, dice corn tortillas into strips and bake at 350 degrees for 15-20 minutes until lightly browned and crispy.

8) Serve soup piled high with tortilla strips. Other fun garnishes include lime wedges, crumbled cotija cheese, avocados, and sour cream.

Preparing the Veggies

I know what you’re thinking: ”Holy crap that’s a lot of ingredients!”

True. But hang in there. Most of them are basic stuff and once they are all in the pot, there’s very little work involved in this meal. You can go cross stuff off your list and come home to a delicious soup.

These are the few veggies that you need to start this soup.

Just a few basics.

The key to these is to dice them pretty finely.

For the Serrano pepper, I left the seeds in. You could take them out though if you’re worried about the heat.

Then just toss all this stuff into your slow cooker!

A fine dice.

Besides the veggies you need a few other things to get this soup going.

This is where a lot of the flavor comes from in this soup.

Flavor town.

Add all this stuff to the crockpot along with your chicken breasts. I would shoot for about a pound of chicken but you could use more if you wanted.

For the chipotle pepper, make sure you dice it very finely. Nobody wants a big bite of chipotle in their soup.

For the dried peppers, you can use almost any dried pepper. I went with New Mexico chile peppers, but poblanos would work also. Just break up the dried peppers into a few pieces and scrape out the seeds. Then throw the dried pieces into the crockpot along with the chicken breasts.

Everybody in the pot!

Add in all your chicken stock which should just barely cover all the ingredients.

A Slow Cook

Set your crockpot to a low heat and let this sucker cook, covered, for at least six hours. If you wanted you could cook it for even longer though. Six hours is the minimum.

After that, your house will smell amazing and your soup will look something like this.

6 hours later...

Finishing the Soup

There’s a few things we need to do to finish this soup now that most of the cooking is done.

For starters, take out the bay leaves and dried peppers from the soup and discard them. They’ve given the soup plenty of flavor and there’s no need to hang on to them.

Next, take out the chicken breasts and use a few forks to gently shred the meat. Then you can return it to the crockpot.

Get it?

Finally, there are three new ingredients that I recommend adding at this point as they don’t need to simmer all day long.

First, add some corn and cilantro sprigs. Second, cube up a few corn tortillas and add those cubes straight to the soup.

Just some more flavor!

Cover this and let it simmer for another 30-45 minutes. The tortillas will soften and some will completely disintegrate into the soup which will give it a really rich texture. The cilantro will give the soup a nice herb flavor.

After it’s second cooking, remove the cilantro stalks and season the soup generously with salt and pepper.

The Garnishes

My favorite part of chicken tortilla soup is serving it with tons of fun garnishes and toppings and then people can kind of make their own bowls.

The essential topping (in my opinion) is crispy tortilla strips. These are super-easy to make. Just cut a few corn tortillas into long strips and bake them at 350 degrees for about 15-20 minutes.

The strips will be lightly browned when the are done and super-crispy.

Great garnish.

Some other topping ideas that I like are sliced avocado, crumbled cotija cheese (or any cheese really), sour cream, and lime wedges.

Some other fun add-ins.

Once your soup is seasoned well with salt and pepper just ladle it into a bowl and pile on the toppings!

From above.

It’s actually a very filling meal for soup because of the chicken, tortillas, and cheese. It’s very warming and just a complete winner of a meal in my book.

Don’t be daunted by the ingredient list here, people. You can and should give this a shot sometime this winter!

The cute little napkins in this post were kindly donated by Oh Little Rabbit.

Good lookin' wrap!

“I think I’m good on cookies for a while.”

That’s what Betsy told me a few days ago and I couldn’t agree with her more. After a full week of nothing but cookies and sugar, I’m ready to move back into the land of the savory.

Heck. I don’t even have a sweet tooth really so I’m very excited to post something without sugar in it.

This quick wrap is something that Betsy and I have been eating recently. I love it because it works great for a lunch dish, but is also good to have if you want a lighter dinner option. It’s pretty healthy actually and jam-packed with flavor.

Baja Chicken Wraps

Yield: 4 wraps

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

1 pound chicken breasts, grilled and chopped
Lettuce
Avocado
Ranch Dressing (homemade is good)
Hot Sauce
Large tortillas

Chicken Marinade:
2 limes, juice
1/4 cup olive oil
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
1 teaspoon chili powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon black pepper

Directions:

1) Mix together marinade ingredients. Add chicken breasts and let marinate for a few minutes.

2) Grill chicken over high heat for about 8-10 minutes per side until they are cooked through.

3) Slice chicken thinly.

4) In a bowl, mix together chopped lettuce, a drizzle of ranch dressing, and a dash of hot sauce.

5) Lay out a large tortilla and put down a layer of the lettuce mixture.

6) Top with about 1/4 of an avocado and a layer of chicken. I recommend about 4 ounces of chicken per wrap.

7) Top with a drizzle of ranch and an extra dash of hot sauce and roll the wrap up.

8) Slice and serve!

Prepping the Chicken

I decided to grill the chicken for these wraps even though it’s December. I’m a year around griller, but if you don’t want to venture out in the cold just to grill a few chicken breasts, you can definitely just sear these in a pan for a few minutes a side and then finish them off in a 350 degree oven.

Whether you grill or not, I recommend giving the chicken breasts some serious flavor with a quick marinade.

Tasty marinade.

I just whisked together some spices with some lime and olive oil and then tossed in my chicken breasts.

You don’t need to marinate these guys very long to give them some flavor. Even 10 minutes in this mixture will do the trick.

All mixed up.

So, like I said, you have two options for cooking the chicken in my mind.

1) Grill them. Pretty straightforward, just toss them on a hot grill for about 8-10 minutes per side until they are cooked through.

2) Sear them in a sturdy pan. Cast iron would work well, but any pan should do the trick. After you sear them for a few minutes over medium-high heat, stick them in a 350 degree oven for 15-20 minutes to finish cooking them. If the pan you sear in isn’t oven-safe, just transfer the breasts to a baking dish for the oven cooking.

The reason you will probably want to finish the chicken breasts in the oven is because they might burn if you keep them over high heat for too long. Finishing them in the oven solves that problem and still gives you a nice sear on the outside.

I just tossed mine on the grill though. That’s easiest and best way to cook chicken breasts in my opinion.

Who says you can't grill in the winter?

Once the chicken breasts cool a bit, slice them up!

Keep in mind that we’re going to be adding these slices to a wrap so try to keep the slices pretty thin.

Thinner the better.

The Lettuce

I love lettuce in wraps, but I wanted to use the lettuce as a flavor vehicle also.

So I ripped up some lettuce (a few cups) and then tossed it with a few tablespoons of homemade ranch dressing and a few dashes of hot sauce. Of course, you don’t have to make homemade ranch dressing for this, but the homemade version is really packed with flavor.

Hot sauce is very important.

Mix this all up really well and you’re ready to make a wrap!

Making the Wraps

You should be able to get about 4 wraps out of one pound of grilled chicken. Of course, that largely depends on how big you make your wraps…

I use the biggest tortillas I could find just so I could really stuff them.

Start by laying down a nice layer of the lettuce. Then add about 1/4 of an avocado that’s sliced up.

Don't skimp on the 'cado.

Top that with some of the grilled chicken and maybe give it an extra drizzle of ranch or hot sauce.

Then you’re ready to roll.

Get it?

Fold the ends toward the center and just roll the wrap up tightly.

While you don’t have to slice this in half, I think it’s a little easier to eat in two pieces. Plus it looks good.

That's a wrap!

There’s a lot of good flavors here. The lime marinade goes perfectly with the rich avocado. The lettuce gives it lots of good crunch and flavor because of the dressing and hot sauce.

If you didn’t want to use chicken, I actually think you could sub tofu for this without too much trouble. I would still marinate it and grill it just like I did with the chicken.

If you’re looking for a really tasty wrap, give this a shot. I thought it was absolutely delicious!

My childhood in a bowl.

There has been some sort of mild plague going around our town for the last few weeks and Betsy’s office has been hit pretty hard with it. It was only a matter of time before one of us woke up sniffling and aching.

I was lucky enough to avoid the sickness this time around but it sure did smack Bets right upside the head.

So I did what I do best when dealing with a sickness: Make soup.

This time around I happened to find these tiny little star-shaped pastas in the grocery store that sent me flying back to my childhood when my mom would always make me chicken and stars soup when I was sick.

So this is my homemade take on chicken and stars soup. It’s soothing and healing and will get you back on your feet again for sure.

Chicken and Stars Soup

Yield: Serves 8-10.

Prep Time: 45 minutes

Total Time: 2 hours 15 minutes

Ingredients:

Stock:
1 whole chicken, cut into pieces
1 large onion, quartered
2 carrots, quartered
2 celery ribs, quartered
1 head garlic, halved
2 Tablespoons olive oil
6-8 sprigs fresh thyme
2 bay leaves
Handful of fresh parsley
20ish black peppercorns
10-12 cups water

Finished Soup:
Stock from above, strained
Shredded chicken from above, remove fat
1/2 onion, diced
2 carrots, peeled and diced
2 celery ribs, diced
1 glove garlic, diced
1 Tablespoon olive oil
1 Teaspoon fresh thyme
6-8 ounces star pasta
Salt and pepper
Crackers and/or crusty bread

Helpful Equipment:
Dutch Oven
Strainer

Directions:

1) Chop chicken into pieces and add the carcass pieces and wings to a large sturdy pot over high heat with a drizzle of oil. Let the chicken pieces brown well over high heat for about 8 minutes. Turn the chicken every few minutes to make it browns evenly.

2) Add your other stock ingredients (including other chicken parts) except the water to the heavy pot and let them all sautee for a few minutes. Try to scrape up any stuck-on bits.

3) Add the water to your pot and make sure you have enough water to barely cover the ingredients. Bring to a simmer and turn the heat down to medium. Simmer the stock on medium, partially covered, for about 60-75 minutes.

4) Remove all the chicken pieces from the stock and let them cool briefly.

5) Strain the warm stock into a large bowl. If there's a lot of fat on the surface of the stock, try to spoon off some of it. It's okay though to have a small layer of fat on the stock for this recipe.

6) Once chicken is cool enough to handle, remove skin from chicken and shred it into bite-sized pieces.

7) In your same large pot, add a new drizzle of olive oil over medium-high heat. Then add all your diced veggies. Sautee for a few minutes until they start to soften. Add fresh thyme and a pinch of salt and pepper.

8) Add stock back to pot and bring to a simmer.

9) Once soup is simmering, stir in stars pasta and cook until al dente, about 9-10 minutes.

10) Finally stir in shredded chicken and season with salt and pepper.

11) Serve soup with crackers or crusty bread.

Making The Stock

I do occasionally take shortcuts and use store-bought stock for some dishes, but there’s absolutely no question that the best way to make a good soup is to make a good stock. It does add at least 90 minutes onto your preparation time (unless you have some frozen), but there’s just no debating that it takes homemade soup to another level.

I like to use a whole chicken when I make chicken soup so there’s a mix of white and dark meat. I like to chop up the chicken before cooking the stock which just makes it a bit easier to work with and gives you an opportunity to brown some of the meat.

Use any pieces you want.

If you’re intimidated by cutting up your own chicken, this video is one of the best I’ve seen at showing the process. It’s really not that hard and after you do two or three, you’ll get really fast at it.

Besides chicken and water, there’s a pretty standard list of vegetables that you’ll need to make a good stock. I wrote down a recipe, but it should be a guide. The good news about making stock is it’s a pretty flexible thing. Feel free to use more or less of the veggies depending on what you have and also don’t worry about chopping them up.

I just kind of quarter all of my vegetables.

Nothing fancy here.

To make the stock (and soup), I like to use a big heavy dutch oven. Add a drizzle of oil to the pan over high heat and then add just your chicken carcass and wings to the pot. That’s probably all that will be able to fit in a nice layer in the pan. If you can fit more chicken pieces, feel free to add them.

Let those chicken pieces cook for about 4-5 minutes per side until they are nice and browned. Some bits might get stuck to the pan and that’s just fine. The browned bits will give the stock a really deep flavor.

After your chicken has browned for a few minutes, you can add all your other veggies, herbs, and seasonings.

The start of something great.

Let these guys cook for a few minutes and try to scrape up any bits stuck to the pan.

Then add any other chicken pieces to the pot and cover the whole thing with water. You want to cover everything by about an inch or so. This will probably work out to 10-12 cups of water.

Bring this all to a simmer and let it simmer and turn your heat down to medium. Let the stock simmer, partially covered, for about 75 minutes. Check on it every 20-30 minutes and if there’s a lot of foam on the surface, just scoop it off with a spoon.

The Soup Pieces

One reason why it really makes sense to make your own stock if you’re making homemade chicken soup is because you have to cook the chicken anyway. Making the stock accomplishes that for you!

Once your stock is cooked, just pull out your chicken pieces, let them cool for 5-10 minutes, and then shred them up. Try to remove as much fat and stuff as possible and just shred the chicken into bite-sized bits.

Get it?

For that delicious stock that’s been simmering, I recommend straining it with a strainer to remove any tiny bits of vegetable or whatever.

If there’s a lot of oil on your stock, try to spoon off some of it. A little bit definitely won’t hurt the soup at all.

This was my strained and finished stock that I used for my soup.

Liquid gold.

For the actual soup, take your time dicing up some veggies so they are roughly the same size. You don’t need a ton of vegetables to make a good soup at this point.

Half an onion, a few ribs of celery, a carrot or two, and a clove of garlic should do the trick.

Chopped nicely...

And, of course, you’ll need some stars. You could obviously use noodles or whatever, but I just think these are fun.

Love stars!

Making the Soup

I didn’t even bother washing out my pot from making the stock. I just added a new drizzle of olive oil, set the pot over medium-high heat, and added all my veggies to it.

Just a few minutes...

Cook the veggies for a few minutes until they start to soften and then add the thyme and all the stock. Bring that all to a simmer and then add your stars.

A Note on Over-starring. I actually added the full 16 ounces of stars to my soup because they looked so tiny! Like any pasta though, they swell! I think my version ended up a bit star-heavy! Six to eight ounces of the star pasta should be enough.

The stars will need to cook for about 9-10 minutes and then you can stir in your shredded chicken and season the soup with salt and pepper.

Done deal. Really not too much work.

Serving the soup

I really like soup like this with crackers, but I know that super-crusty bread is also a hit. Any way you scoop it, this is just a good bowl of soup.

So good.

Betsy ate this for a few meals (I did too just to ward off the germs) and she was feeling much better after about 24 hours!

I take full credit for her recovery.

Bat wings will attract a lot of flies.

It’s very well-documented that bats are one of the most delicious of winged animals. Hanging upside down all day really makes their wings very tasty and tender.

The problem, of course, is getting bats. A bat hunter must be very careful as bats are known to suck the blood of any aggressor.

So proceed with caution.

I happen to be a very skilled bat hunter so it was no problem for me to bag a few dozen with the help of my faithful hunting dog, Porter.

Bat Wings

Yield: Serves 4.

Prep Time: 15 minutes + marinating time

Total Time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

2-3 pounds chicken wings, with tips
1 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup black bean sauce
1/4 cup tamarind paste (or oyster sauce)
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 Tablespoon chili garlic sauce
2 Tablespoons black food coloring (equal parts red, green, blue, yellow)

Directions:

1) Mix all ingredients except chicken wings in a medium bowl. Whisk well to make sure everything is combined.

2) Reserve 1/4 cup of the marinade for basting later. Pour all the rest of the marinade into a large plastic bag with the chicken wings and seal tightly.

3) Let wings marinate for 2 hours in the fridge. If possible. flip them every 30 minutes to make sure they are getting coated evenly.

4) Preheat oven to 375 and line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

5) Remove wings from marinade (discard marinade) and shake extra marinade off the wings. Then lay them on baking sheets.

6) Bake wings for 30-35 minutes until wings are dark black and cooked through. The juices should run clear.

7) Baste wings once halfway through cooking and then again when the wings come out with reserved marinade.

8) Serve immediately!

Adapted from a Martha Stewart recipe.

A Confession

Ok. They aren’t really bat wings. I don’t imagine I would be any good searching through caves for bats and Porter would be even worse. His Velcro fur would have all kinds of strange dirt and bat poop in it by the time we were done.

Plus, I’m pretty sure he’s scared of the dark.

But bat wings are still awesome to serve for Halloween. You can fake out most people by using chicken wings and lots of dark marinade. It also happens to be a very flavorful marinade!

Mostly black stuff.

I was worried that the saltiness and flavor of this marinade would be completely overpowering, but it works really well actually.

It’s really important to add some sweetness to the marinade though to counteract some of the salty flavors.

So don’t forget the brown sugar.

Most important.

This marinade is pretty dark as it is, but I wanted to make sure my wings were as black as possible so I mixed up some actual black food coloring to add to the marinade to give the wings a little extra color.

This is optional. It doesn’t affect the flavor at all, just the color.

You won’t be able to find black food coloring, but it’s pretty easy to make if you recall from 3rd grade art class that black is just all the colors mixed together. I did about 15 drops of each color and got exactly black.

More blackness!

Whisk this all together with your other marinade ingredients and you’ll have this really dark marinade that’s very flavorful. I wouldn’t recommend trying it on it’s own. I did and my face was puckered up for the next two hours.

Reserve about 1/4 cup of this marinade for basting later.

Pretty tasty.

Marinading the Chicken

Add the chicken wings to a large plastic bag with all the marinade except the bit that you reserve for later. Try to get out as much air as possible and seal up the bag nice and tight.

Crazy...

Let these guys marinate for about 2 hours and, if you can, flip them every 30 minutes or so. That’s make sure that the wings are coated evenly with the marinade.

Cooking the wings

It’s really important to bake these guys on some parchment paper. The marinade is pretty sticky and if you bake it just on baking sheets you’ll have a big sticky mess on your hands.

Throw down some parchment paper and you’ll be all set.

The other important part about these wings is to make sure you shake off a lot of the extra marinade from the wings. It’s really strong and you don’t want it caked on the wings.

They'll get blacker.

Bake these guys at 350 degrees for about 35 minutes.

Halfway through the baking time and also at the end give them all a quick (and light) baste of the reserved marinade. This will just make the color and flavor a lot deeper.

Go light on it.

Once these guys come out of the oven, it’s best to serve them right away. Cold wings generally aren’t that appealing to people.

Although flies will probably eat them no matter what.

One last shot.

If I were going to serve these bad boys at a party, I’d be sure to label them “Bat Wings” just to add to the illusion a bit.

Besides being kind of cool looking, they also happen to be delicious.

If you can’t get your hands on some real bat wings, these will do the trick.

Best hard tacos ever.

When it comes to tacos, I’m a big fan of the hard shell, but sometimes I find store-bought hard shell tacos to be kind of flimsy. Like with some tortilla chips, I feel like the manufacturers aren’t starting with whole corn tortillas. They’re probably starting with some strange paste that they can mold and fry, but the end results are always a bit sub-par.

Homemade hard shell tacos are a bit tricky though. You need to hold them in place and fry them until crispy. They do make a strange device that will make it possible to do this at home, but personally that seems like more work than it’s worth.

So I came up with a much quicker and easier method for making darn good crispy tacos at home. These are actually a delicious mash up between an enchilada, a taco, and a taquito. But trust me, you’ll have a hard time giving them up once you try them!

Shredded Chicken Hard Tacos

Yield: 12 tacos

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 50 minutes

Ingredients:

1 pound boneless skinless chicken breast, poached and shredded
1 15 ounce can black beans, drained and rinsed
1/2 red onion, diced
1-2 jalapenos, minced
1/2 Cup salsa
6 ounces pepper jack cheese, shredded
12 corn tortillas
Salt and pepper
Olive oil

Toppings:
Sour Cream
Avocado
Lettuce
Hot Sauce

Directions:

1) Add chicken breasts to a medium pot and cover with water by 1/2 inch. Bring to a simmer and simmer for about 15 minutes or until chicken is cooked through.
2) Once chicken has cooled a bit, shred it. Also, dice onion and pepper and drain and rinse the beans.
3) Add 2 tablespoons olive oil to a medium pan over medium heat. Once hot, add onions and peppers and cook until soft. Then stir in shredded chicken, black beans, and salsa.
4) Stir mixture until it's heated through and season with salt and pepper.
5) On a large griddle or in a large skillet, add a tablespoon of olive oil over medium-high heat. Working with one tortilla at a time, add it to the hot pan and top one half with chicken and shredded cheese. Fold tortilla over to form a taco. Press down on it lightly so it holds it's shape and move it to the outer part of the pan while you work on a second one. Do as many tacos as you can fit at once without them overlapping.
6) Cook tacos for about 3 minutes per side until tortilla is crispy and cheese is well-melted.
7) Serve tacos immediately with avocado, hot sauce, lettuce, and sour cream.

Preparing the Filling

There are really no rules when it comes to fillings for these tacos. I used some chicken and black beans, but you could take it in any direction really.

If you do want to use chicken though, the easiest way to prep it for the filling is to lightly poach it in a few inches of water for about 10 minutes or until it’s cooked through completely. Depending on the thickness of your chicken breast, you might need a few more minutes. Then, once your chicken is cool, you can shred it up with a fork.

You could also use leftover chicken from a different meal.

Poached and shredded.

Besides the chicken, I also recommend using some fresh red onion and jalapeno which gives the filling great Tex-mex flavors.

Just dice both relatively small. If you want more heat, then leave the seeds in the peppers.

Good Tex-mex flavors.

To finish off the filling, add a drizzle of oil to a medium pan over medium heat and add your onions and peppers. Cook them until they are soft, about 4-5 minutes, then stir in your chicken drained black beans.

The filling stuff.

I like to add some salsa to mine also which just kind of rounds out the flavors and ties everything together. It’s a bit of a shortcut, but it works like a charm.

Stir this all together over medium heat until the filling is hot.

Salsa is a helper here.

Making the Tacos

These tacos are actually pretty easy to make. Don’t be intimidated!

Corn tortillas are really strong. They don’t burn easily so you have a lot of flexibility in your cooking time which is nice. I like to make mine on a large griddle but you could also use a large skillet.

Just add a drizzle of oil to the pan and get it hot over medium-high heat. Then work with one tortilla at a time. Start by just warming the tortilla up for a seconds and then top half of it with a large spoonful of filling.

Like so:

Try not to overstuff.

Next, top it with some grated cheese. Any cheese will work, but I like pepper jack.

A little goes a long way.

Then the only tricky part is to fold the top part of the taco over. Once you have the taco folded over, press down on it lightly so it holds it’s shape.

The very important fold.

Once you have one taco shaped, you can move it out to the side of the pan and get started on a second taco. When I’m really rocking and rolling, I can do about six at a time on my griddle.

Cook them for about 3-4 minutes per side so they get nice and crispy on the outside.

Nice and crispy.

Toppings and Servings

I made up a plate of some of my favorite taco toppings for these guys including sour cream, avocado, and chopped lettuce. Hot sauce wouldn’t be a bad idea either.

Standard taco fare.

Serve up a few of the tacos with some toppings and you are in for a treat! Three tacos is a pretty hearty meal. Two would be a good lunch.

Awesome plate of food.

These guys turn crispy and delicious as they cook and then you can kind of pry them open and stuff them with all kinds of delicious toppings. The shells are a lot more substantial than those flimsy guys you buy in the store that crack and shatter with the slightest touch.

I know these are good because my Tex-Mex aficionado wife requested them two nights in a row!

Do not make in advance...

I was at a conference last week in Los Angeles and I had what might have been the worst catered lunch I’ve ever had in my life (that really says something by the way). It was some sort of strange chicken alfredo business that I’m almost positive was from a jar. Not to mention it was cold, clumpy, and the chicken looked about two weeks old.

I’m not really sure why a chef would ever think alfredo is a good thing to serve to 500 people. After all, it’s really best right away and even a few minutes after it’s plated, it can start to congeal and turn a bit gross. So I felt a bit bad for the chef for trying something like that.

I felt worse for the alfredo though. It got a bad rep after that meal. I’m sure there were people that left that lunch thinking they would never eat alfredo again which is a sad state of affairs.

After all, assuming you can master one or two things and assuming you aren’t trying to feed a million people, alfredo sauce is super-easy and one of the most delicious things you can put on a pasta.

Grilled Chicken Alfredo

Yield: Serves 4.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 40 minutes

Ingredients:

8 ounces Fettuccine, cooked al dente
4 Tablespoons butter
3/4 Cup heavy cream
1 Cup Parmesan cheese, grated
2 large chicken breasted (I think 1/2 chicken breast per person is enough for this meal, but you could up it if you wanted.)
Olive oil
Salt and pepper

Directions:

1) Drizzle chicken with olive oil, salt and pepper. Grill chicken until cooked through on medium-high heat. It should take about 18 minutes, but could vary based on the size of your chicken breasts. Be sure to turn the breasts once halfway through cooking.

2) Cook pasta according to package. Reserve a cup of cooking water.

3) For sauce, grate Parm in a large bowl. Melt butter in medium sauce pan over medium heat.

4) Once butter is melted, stir in cream and continue to stir until sauce starts to thicken, about 4-5 minutes.

5) The sauce is done when you can leave a streak in it with a spatula.

6) Pour sauce over grated cheese and let sit for 2 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

7) Add drained pasta to bowl and toss well to combine.

8) Serve immediately with sliced chicken.

Preparing the Chicken

Since the sauce and pasta are so flavorful and rich for this dish, I didn’t want to do too much to the chicken. I just drizzled it with some olive oil and gave it a good pinch of salt and pepper. I like my breast with the skin on, but Betsy likes her skinless.

Not a problem.

No need for anything fancy.

You could sear this chicken in a pan and then finish it in a 350 degree oven, but I wanted to grill it. I just grilled the chicken on medium-high heat for about 18 minutes, flipping it once half way through the cooking time. Depending on the size of your chicken breasts, you might need to adjust that cooking time a bit.

Mine turned out really nice though.

Good stuff.

Making the Alfredo Sauce

This is one of the jarred sauces that I just don’t get. I know it’s popular, but you can make real alfredo sauce with just three ingredients.

Maybe alfredo sauce needs to be a homemade trial…

All you need!

Seriously though. That’s it. Just three ingredients plus some salt and pepper.

Start by melting your butter in a medium pan like so…

Easy enough so far...

Once it’s melted, turn your heat down to medium-low and add in the cream. It’s important to stir it constantly once you add the cream. Once the cream gets hot, it’ll start to thicken almost immediately. You’re sauce is done with you can leave a good streak in it with a spatula which you should be able to do after just a few minutes.

This was my finished sauce.

The right thickness!

What about the Parmesan you ask?

Well, that goes in a bowl like this. Grate the cheese as fine as you can so it’ll melt easily.

Just parm. Lots of it.

Then just pour the sauce over the grated cheese and let it sit for a few minutes. Season it with salt and pepper and you’re done!

The Pasta

I guess you could use a few different pastas for this dish, but fettuccine is really the standard so just stick with that.

The only pasta you need.

Once you get your pasta boiling, take a small bowl and scoop out some of the hot pasta water. If your alfredo sauce gets too thick, you can add a few tablespoons of pasta water to it and it’ll loosen up but still stay nice and smooth.

Think of it like alfredo sauce insurance. If you do everything right, you won’t need it.

But you’ll probably need it.

Sauce insurance.

Once your pasta is cooked, just drain it and toss it right in your bowl with the sauce. Stir it all together really well and add some pasta water if it’s too thick.

This might not look like a lot of pasta, but it’s really rich and this is easily enough for 3 or 4 people assuming you serve it with the chicken and a side salad or something.

Done deal.

It’s all about time

The most important thing when it comes to a cream sauce like this is to serve it as soon as possible.

Don’t dilly-dally.

Very delicious.

Anytime I have a really bad meal at a restaurant or something, I always try to re-do it when I get a chance.

It’s almost always not the dish’s fault. That was totally the case with this dish.

And now for something completely different!

I was totally pumped when chicken wings won the poll last week. You guys are my people.

I make chicken wings quite a bit but I’ve only posted a few versions. That’s because normally I just coat them in the hottest sauce I can find and eat them with blue cheese. It’s pretty hard to beat that.

But I realize that not everyone likes to burn their faces off while snacking so I figured I’d chill out the heat a bit for this version and try to crank up the savory flavor. I was really happy how these wings turned out and because they are baked they’re healthy right?

Baked Parmesan Wings

Yield: Serves 4.

Prep Time: 10 minutes + Wing soak time

Total Time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

2 pounds chicken wings, I left mine whole, but you could just as easily chop them up.
4 Cups buttermilk
1 Cup bread crumbs
1 Teaspoon dried oregano
1 Teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 Teaspoon cayenne
1 Teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 Cup butter, melted
1/2 Cup Parmesan cheese, grated
Non-stick spray

Horseradish dipping sauce:
3/4 Cup yogurt
1/4 Cup sour cream
2 Tablespoons grated horseradish (not horseradish sauce)

Directions:

1) Soak chicken wings in buttermilk for at least 30 minutes, but overnight would be good.

2) Mix together breading ingredients until they are an even texture.

3) Coat each wing with breading and lay it on a baking sheet that's been lightly sprayed with nonstick spray.

4) Bake the wings at 375 for 45 minutes.

5) Mix together sauce ingredients while the wings bake.

6) Serve the wings right away with the sauce.

Prepping the Wings

I’m not sure which is harder: setting up a frying station or making a quick breading and baking the wings. I actually think the frying station is more work but the wings definitely cook a lot faster that way.

In my mind, it’s a toss up, but I think most people would probably consider the breading and baking path to be a bit easier.

Flavorful stuff!

It’s as simple as stirring up all your ingredients and then pouring in your melted butter.

Once you butter is added, make sure the butter is really well distributed throughout the breading. It should be a nice even consistency.

Butter never hurts.

On this given day, I was completely lazy and just left my wings whole. For some reason people feel like you have to cut them up, but I think they end up better when they are whole. They stay more moist I think.

If I’m serving them at a party then I chop them up just because that’s what most people expect, but when I’m making them just for me, I leave them whole.

Before you bread the wings, give them a quick soak in buttermilk. By quick I mean at least 20-30 minutes, but overnight would be fantastic if you have the time.

Buttermilk bath!

Then just pull your wings out of the buttermilk and give them a good coating in the breading. Feel free to go heavy on the breading as some will fall off in the oven.

Really pack it on there.

Go heavy on the coating.

Then just lay out all the breaded wings on a large baking sheet. If you cut them up, you’ll probably need two baking sheets.

I’d recommend giving the baking sheet a quick spray with some nonstick spray also or you may have some sticking when the wings come out of the oven.

An veritable army!

Bake these guys at 375 degrees for about 45 minutes. Wings are kind of dense so they take longer to cook than a chicken breast even though the breast is larger.

The Sauce

Like I said, I normally just go with blue cheese dressing for my dipping sauce on wings, but I decided to change it up a bit.

I’m glad I did.

I whipped this sauce up from stuff I had in my fridge and it was my favorite part of the meal. Just three ingredients, but they make a seriously good sauce.

This just might work...

The key, of course, is the horseradish. It’s got a subtle spiciness to it that holds up really well with the parmesan crust on the wings.

The only thing to remember when buying horseradish is to check the ingredients. Some companies but all kinds of crap in their horseradish.

It should really only have three ingredients: horseradish, vinegar, salt. Anything else is more than you need.

Boar’s head makes a really good horseradish and is usually in the deli section.

I love this stuff.

Some Good Wings

These wings will smell fantastic when they are baking. They should have a really nice browned crust when they come out of the oven.

OH man.

Assuming you sprayed the sheet well, the wings should come up without too much of an issue.

Then just toss them on a plate and serve them with lots of that delicious sauce.

Different, but good.

In my opinion, these wings are perfect for people that don’t like wings. They have a very different taste than your standard wings, but they still have a tiny amount of spice because of the cayenne and horseradish.

It’s football time this weekend so if you’re on the lookout for a good (and different) wing recipe, try these guys out.

As an aside, I think you could use the breading on any chicken cut really. You could use it on whole drumsticks or chicken breasts and make a really nice meal out of it.