Stuffing and Cheese Stuffed Chicken Breasts

Ingredients:
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
4 String Cheese sticks
1 box, Twin-pack (2, 6 ounce packets) Cornbread Stuffing Mix, Mrs. Cubbison's
1 can Cream of Celery soup
2 eggs, divided
1/4 cup milk
Dash Louisiana hot sauce
2-3 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350-degrees. Working with one chicken breast at a time, place into a gallon-size zip bag, leaving baggy unzipped, pound meat out with smooth side of a meat mallet to approximately double width (about 5" x 7" x 1/4") rectangle. Remove flattened breast from bag and place on plate. Top with wax paper. Repeat process with remaining three breasts. Set aside.


Pour one of the 6 ounce bags of stuffing mix into a clean gallon-size ziploc bag. With rolling pin or smooth side of meat mallet, smash stuffing mix into crumbs. Pour into low flat bowl and set aside.

In another low flat bowl, combine milk and one egg, with one dash of hot sauce. Whisk to combine and set aside.

Place cream of celery soup (undiluted) into a medium-size, microwave safe bowl. Nuke until heated through. Add contents of second 6 ounce bag stuffing mix and one slightly beaten egg to the heated soup and stir until well combined. Divide stuffing mixture into fourths. With hands, pack one-fourth of the stuffing around one string cheese. Place stuffing encased cheese on short end of flattened chicken breast and roll into tube shape. Repeat with remaining cheese, stuffing and chicken.

Dip stuffed chicken rolls into milk/egg mixture and roll in stuffing bread crumbs. Meanwhile, heat olive oil and butter in large skillet. Place stuffed chicken rolls in hot skillet and bake approximately 3 minutes, give a quarter turn and bake another 3 minutes, repeat until all four sides are browned. Spray small casserole dish with non-stick spray and place browned stuffed chicken rolls into casserole dish. Bake uncovered for 30 minutes. Let set 5 minutes before cutting - then cut into thirds or fourths and fan out a single roll onto a plate or all four onto a platter.

This is a simple dish to prepare but it is also company worthy in that is looks fairly elegant when you cut the rolls open to expose the lovely swirls of layers and oozing cheese. The crunchy outer coating really makes this dish stand well on it's own (as in without gravy).

Tonight I served this dish with a side of scored new potatoes (recipe to follow) and some steamed broccoli. Since it is just the two of us we have two rolls leftover. I'm thinking tomorrow night I'll slice the stuffed rolls into 1/2 inch slices and serve on sourdough bread with cranberry sauce and cream cheese - should make GREAT sandwiches!

Crispy Scored New Potatoes

1 pound new potatoes
1-2 tablespoons olive oil
Kosher salt and coarse ground black pepper

Preheat oven to 350-degrees.

Cut each new potato in half. Score hashmarks just slightly into cut side of each half. Place in a single layer in a large roasting pan. Toss with salt, pepper and oil. Turn each half so that cut/scored side is up.

Bake for 30 minutes. Turn each half cut side down and continue to bake for aproximately 15 minutes more or until cut sides of potatoes are golden brown. These are so tasty they don't need butter or further seasoning.

Chipotle-Maple Glazed Drummettes and Spicy Spanish Rice

You are going to love the blend of smokey chipotle and rich maple! My new favorite combo...

Chipotle-Maple Glazed Chicken
12-16 chicken drummettes
1/2 cup maple syrup
1/2 cup honey
1, 7 ounce can chipotle peppers in adobo sauce*
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
*(Remove 2-3 peppers and set aside to use in rice).

Preheat oven to 450-degrees.

Combine the honey, maple syrup, and chipotle peppers (setting aside 2 or 3 to go in the Spanish rice) with adobo sauce in a large, re-sealable plastic bag. Smoosh contents together to mix and then add the chicken to the bag and seal with as little air as possible in the bag.  Marinate for a minimum of 2 hours or overnight.

I have found that placing meat in a baggie with a marinade, even with barely any air in the bag, parts of the meat are still left uncovered and you have to keep going in and shifting the bag to make sure the meat is equally soaked. To solve this problem, I like to put my 'marinade bags' inside another container to insure each piece of meat stays completely covered by the liquid during the whole marinade process.

Line a baking sheet with foil and spray with non-stick cooking spray. Place the chicken on a foil-lined baking shee and bake approximately 20 to 25 minutes until skin has carmalized and darkened. (Increase cooking time by approximately 10 minutes for regular size drumsticks/wings if you do not have access to drummettes).  Place chicken on serving platter and top with chopped cilanatro.

Spicy Spanish Rice
1/2 cup long grain, white rice
1/2 cup water
1, 15 ounce can, Stagg Chili, Vegetable Garden 4-bean Chili
2 or 3 chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, minced finely

I use a rice cooker and if you don't own one, I highly recommend that you look into getting one. You will never have under or overdone rice again!  Simply put all of the above ingredients into the rice cooker, stir. Cover and set the timer per your appliance recommendations, in my case for 60 minutes.   When done, carefully remove the lid - steam hurts! Stir and serve. I like to serve my Spanish rice in tortilla bowls. 

Please note; chipotle peppers are very, very spicy - so if you're not a fan of hot, you can reduce the number of chili's you add to this - or, you can open the chilis and remove their seeds (discard seeds), but if you do this, use gloves to prevent the chili oil from getting on your fingers and possibly later into your eyes.

Sweet-Potato Chips & BLATTO's (Bacon, lettuce, avocado, tomato, turkey & crispy onion sandwich)

Sweet Potato Chips
Sweet potatoes (baking potatoes or yams work too-in fact these might have been yams)
Canola oil, for frying
Seasoning  *(I used a roasted garlic and sea salt blend, but you can use any seasoning you wish)

Start by pouring a minimum of 1" oil (I use Canola or Safflower oil) into your deep fryer. My crockpot doubles as both, so I just set the temperature to "fry" and know it is ready when I dip the tip of whatever I happen to be frying at the time into the oil - if it sizzles it is ready. Do not over crowd your oil. Only put enough items to be fried to make a single layer.  For chips you really need to have either an extremely sharp knife and very steady hand - or much easier, a mandolin slicer. (I LOVE my mandolin!)

Slice your sweet potatoes as thin as possible. Once the oil is hot enough, fry chips in batches - they only take a few seconds. You will see the center of the chip bubble up, this is where I use tongs to flip them. By the time you get the 8 to 10 chips flipped it is time to remove them to a paper towel to drain and season. After seeing how easy these were to make, I am excited to experiment with other root vegetables so watch for future postings. =)

The B.L.A.T.T.O. Club Sandwich

(Bacon, lettuce, avocado, tomato, turkey and French fried onion)

I finally got that roast turkey sandwich I was craving...but as you may be figuring out about me, I always have something leftover in the fridge I need to use up. Tonight I needed to work an avocado from our taco nights, plus there were the French fried onions leftover from last nights green bean casserole. Hence, the B.L.T. grew into the B.L.A.T.T.O. - - -

Discoveries ~ 1) Just like fried chicken, when you store your French Fried Onions, do not cover them if you want to keep them fresh. 2) When frying sweet potatoes, it is harder to tell when they are 'done' than when working with a regular potato as they are so much darker in color...to get the chips evenly crispy, fry any thicker chips together (as well as any extra thin strips simultaneously). It's no big deal, they taste great if not quite done...I'm just a major crunch freak so coming across an occasional chewy chip center doesn't do it for me.

Ideas to try ~ This is the first time I have made sweet-potato chips but I have made sweet potato fries before and they taste REALLY great with a sweet-salty seasoning (equal amounts of super fine sugar and salt). I've also added a dash of cayenne pepper to the sugar/salt blend...mmmm mmm.

I can't wait to peruse the produce department for other root veggies to try this on...sugar beets, rutabegas, carrots...wow, who doesn't want to play - seriously!

Like a mini-Thanksgiving...

I had purchased a bone-in turkey breast to roast because I was craving turkey meat for sandwiches...not the pressed-processed junk you find in most deli's but the real thing. However, after spending the day tending to my bed-ridden hubby, I figured we could both do with a "comfort" meal. I decided to roast the turkey and serve with mashed potatoes, gravy and since I had a few leftover green beans, a form of green-bean hot-dish.

Roast Turkey Breast:  Oil the turkey breast with approximately 2 T. olive oil and sprinkle generously with salt and pepper over all sides. Place the breast, skin side up, in a roasting pan and then sliced up 4 T. pats of hard butter, and shove underneath the turkey skin. Covere the breast loosely with foil and baked it at 350-degrees for an hour - at which time you'll want to remove the foil - drain the drippings for the gravy - and return the breast to the oven to finish cooking for approximately 30 minutes. (Meat thermometer should read 161-degrees). When the roast was done I removed it from the oven - recovered it with foil and let it sit for 20 minutes before carving up. During this time the meat will continue to cook and the juices we re-absorb into the meat.

First off, I knew the breast would not render enough drippings for gravy, so I turned to my pantry for one of my favorite stand-by's...Country gravy mix. Instead of following the package directions, I mixed the gravy powder with 1 & 1/2 cups chicken broth and 1/2 cup of the drippings from the turkey breast - brought it to a boil in a small saucepan, then turned the heat to low and stirred constantly until thickened.

I added one small can of green beans to the wee amount of cooked fresh green beans I had from a previous meal. In a medium bowl I combined one can of cream of mushroom soup, 1 T. flour, and 1/4 can milk - stirred to combine and then tossed in the green beans and stirred to mix. Put this mixture in a casserole and baked it at 350-degrees for 30 minutes.

For the French Onion Topping - I didn't have any in the pantry to I decided to make some. I had done this before when we spent Thanksgiving in Australia this past November. As they did not carry such an item in the stores, I made my own. Here is how:   For just the hubby and I, I cut 1/2 sweet onion into slices approximately 1/4" x 1" to 1 1/2" strips. In a quart-size zip-baggy I put a few dashes of Louisiana Hot sauce and 1 c. milk...smooshed together to mix and added the sliced onion. I let them soak for about a half hour before draining. In another quart-size baggy I added 3/4 c. flour with 1 T. each salt and pepper. Into this bag I added the drained onion strips and tossed to coat. Shaking off the excess flour, add the onion to a pan filled with 1" high vegetable oil heated to approximately 350-degrees. Cook in batches if needed - never adding more onion that can cover the bottom of the pan. Remove golden onion bits from the oil with a straining spoon and let drain on paper towel.  Instead of adding these to the top of the casserole while baking - I learned from my experience in Australia that the onions get too well-done - so instead, I waited until I plated up the beans to put the crunchy goodies on top for serving.

Final step was to open a can of cranberry sauce and serve everything up on a tray to my hubby who was delightfully surprised at this unexpected mini-Thanksgiving meal.

Let the Halloween Recipes Begin!

Halloween is just around the corner and although I don’t care for candy, I LOVE Halloween. I have a blast coming up with fun recipes and party ideas. Between now and Halloween I will share many of my past successes with you and maybe some new ones!

I will start with one of my most requested recipes:

BAT WINGS

Halloween Bat Wings
2 lbs. chicken wings, tips intact

Marinade:
1 cup soy sauce
1 cup red wine
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 T. ginger, minced
4 cloves fresh garlic, minced
1 to 4 tablespoons Louisiana hot sauce (you pick heat level)
1 teaspoon black food coloring*

Rinse wings and pat dry. Open wings up and press flat to resemble bat wings. Put all marinade ingredients into a heavy duty re-sealable baggie and squish to mix thoroughly. Add the wings, keeping them opened flat as much as possible, and marinate wings for at least 12 hours, turning occasionally to ensure each wing blackens thoroughly. The food color will turn the wings a greenish color, then a purplish color before they turn black.

Remove wings from marinade. Discard marinade. Lay out wings flat on the grill and cook over medium grill for approximately 20-25 minutes.
Once you get past the creepy appearance, the taste is wonderful!

*Black food color can be found in specialty stores such as cake decorating and candy stores - also carried at times in craft stores and your local grocery store.

Tomorrow I'll show you how to make a glowing, Toxic Waste Punch!

Teriyaki Chicken Turned Asian Fusion Pizza

Teriyaki Chicken

4 cups Yoshida Teriyaki Marinade
6 pieces raw chicken, bone-in, skin on (I used breasts and thighs)

Place chicken and marinade in re-sealable bag and refrigerate overnight and all day the next day.

1 1/2 to 2 hours prior to dinner remove chicken from the fridge and bring to room temp (approximately 30 minutes).

Preheat oven to 350-degrees F. Drain marinade off chicken and place meat in roasting pan that has been coated with non-stick cooking spray. Bake chicken for 30 minutes.

Remove chicken from the oven and place on medium-high grill. Bake 5 minutes or until meat has seared and releases easily from the grill. Turn chicken over and bake another 5 minutes. Remove from grill and cover with foil until ready to serve.

I served the chicken with steamed broccoli and made a "faux Asian noodle" side dish using a spaghetti squash, grated carrots, chopped spring onion and a dressing of soy, sherry, sesame oil, and hot chili oil (served warm).

Re-inventing leftovers, I came up with this incredible blend for a pizza. Enjoy!
(We sure did!)

Asian-Infused Pizza
1 batch pizza dough
2 cups leftover Teriyaki chicken shredded
1/4 cup bottled Hoisin sauce
1/3 cup shredded carrot
1/3 cup julienned red onion
1/3 cup julienned green pepper (capsicum)
1 roasted pineapple (instructions below)
1/2 cup cashews, shelled and roughly chopped
2 cups Gouda cheese, shredded

Preheat oven to 375-degrees. Lightly oil baking sheet or pizza pan. Sprinkle 1 to 2 tablespoons corn meal over oil. Shape pizza dough onto pan and lightly coat with oil. Bake for 10 minutes. Remove from oven and put toppings on in the following order:  Hoisin sauce, shredded Teriyaki chicken, shredded carrots, julienned red onion, julienned green pepper and top with 1/4 inch thick slices of pineapple, chopped cashews and lastly the Gouda cheese. Return to oven and bake for approximately 20 to 25 minutes until dough is cooked through and cheese is slightly golden. Serves 4 (Unless one of the four is my husband - he practically ate the whole pizza himself!)

Instructions for Roasting a Pineapple: Slice both top and bottom off of pineapple. Remove skin by standing the pineapple up on the counter and running your chef's knife down the sides of the fruit. Then cut the pineapple in quarters, lengthwise and remove the center core from each piece. Toss fruit in a bowl with 2 tablespoons of balsamic vinegar. Bake in oiled roasting dish at 350-degrees F. for 230 minutes.  Once fruit has cooled to room temp, slice as needed for whatever dish you are using it for...don't let it sit out too long - roasted pineapple has a tendency to disappear as quickly as candy when left out!

Saturday Night BBQ

I love September evenings in Southern California when the weather begins to cool and you can BBQ without baking yourself in the process. Tonight we had barbecued chicken, fruit salad and grilled corn on the cob so sweet it didn't even need butter!

Barbecued Chicken

2 large chicken breasts, bone-in and skin on, halved
2 ½ cups of your favorite BBQ sauce, divided

Place all four pieces of chicken and 2 cups of the barbecue sauce into a gallon size zip baggy. Refrigerate overnight.

30 minutes prior to grilling, remove chicken from the marinade and pat dry. Spray a baking dish with non-stick cooking spray and bake chicken at 350-degrees F for 30 minutes. Remove from oven and brush with additional barbecue sauce, then grill for approximately 5 minutes per side until done.

Fruit Salad

1 kiwi fruit, sliced
1 mango, sliced
6-8 strawberries, sliced
1/2 cup blueberries
3 large mint leaves, chopped
1 tablespoon fig balsamic
1 tablespoon honey
Sprinkling of poppy seeds

Toss together and refrigerate for approximately one hour prior to serving. Garnish with sprig of mint leaves.

Grilled Corn on the Cob

4 ears corn, husks still attached
Salt
Raw sugar
Ivah’s House Seasoning
Olive oil
Kitchen twine

Cut any straw from the top of the corn cob. Remove one or two of the outer husks and throw away. Gently begin to peel husks down like you would peel a banana, without detaching. Once they are all peeled, tie the husks approximately 1 ½ inches from the end of the ear of corn.

Fill a large pot with hot water. Add a tablespoon or so each of salt and raw sugar. Place corn in pot, keeping husks out of the water. Bring water to a boil and immediately remove corn. Place on large sheet of foil. Drizzle with olive oil. Salt to taste and sprinkle with my house seasoning. Wrap in foil until ready to grill. Grill for approximately 2 minutes, turn cobs a quarter turn, grill another 2 minutes, and so on, until corn has lovely caramelized striping. Wrap in foil once again until ready to serve.