Chicken, Tequila, and an Open Flame

Ina seems so detail oriented, doesn't she? So don't you think she might mention that putting her Tequila Lime Chicken on a hot grill is roughly the equivalent of signalling an orbiting spacecraft with a flare? I've never marinated meat in alcohol before, and frankly, I wasn't prepared for the shooting flames. It all worked out okay, as this was a really tasty dish. It's just that I liked having eyebrows!


Nonetheless, this was really good. This recipe calls for the chicken to marinate overnight in a mixture of tequila, fresh lime juice, fresh orange juice, garlic, jalapenos, and chile powder. The next time I make this, I think I'll add some pineapple juice, as well as some chopped cilantro. This recipe also calls for boneless chicken breasts with skin on. Our local supermarket didn't have any, so I had my first experience of deboning chicken last night. It worked out quite well; I wasted only a little bit of meat on a couple of the portions--and I didn't cut myself. Life is good!



Leaving the skin on definitely allowed the chicken to stay moister on the grill, and the flavors of the marinade permeated every bit of the meat. This meat would also be great wrapped in warm tortillas with a sweep of guacamole and pico de gallo.



My choice tonight, though, was traditional rather than ethnic. I served this alongside fluffy baked potatoes and Parmesan Roasted Asparagus. In Barefoot Contessa: Family Style, this asparagus recipe can be found in the appetizer section, along with the explanation that Italians would typically eat their vegetables as part of an antipasti course. I've categorized it as a vegetable, because it's highly unlikely that I would serve it as an appetizer. At any rate, I slipped the pan of asparagus in the oven about half an hour after starting the potatoes. They both cooked happily at 400 degrees, and allowed me to time my dinner to have everything ready at once. Like the other vegetable "recipes" in the book, this one is really a bit of a no-brainer. However, I had never tried adding Parmesan cheese to roasted asparagus. It was good, though--really good. Even the non-veggie and non-cheese eater in our house declared that he could eat vegetables like this. Roasting has been my preferred veggie cooking method for quite some time, and it looks like the addition of Parmesan will join the ranks of tried-and-true methods.


Tomorrow, I will try to post some recipes mentioned earlier in the week, as well as links to some of my other favorite places (and blogs) on the web.

Never trust a weatherman!

Living in the middle of a desert, I crave gray, rainy days. Given the weatherman's promises of late, I was hoping for a little of this:

What I got instead, though, was a whole bunch of this:

Not exactly what I was looking for. I didn't even get a good dinner. Instead, I stopped at the local Subway with a colleague on my way to a board meeting. I had my camera with me, and thought about taking a picture. That, my friends, would be sad. You ALL know what Subway looks like.

However, I did get to see several staff members from our district receive prestigious awards. I'm very proud of what our school district does for kids. While I honestly don't get excited about the thought a meeting after a long day of work, it's always energizing to be reminded of all the good things we're doing and the commitment so many have to making the future brighter for children.

Tomorrow night, The Plan will be back in operation. While I don't want to give away any secrets, I'll give you a sneak peak at some key ingredients of tomorrow night's dinner:

Thank goodness tomorrow is Friday! See you tomorrow night.

A deviation from "The Plan"

I started this blog with a plan--to cook from one cookbook until...I did something different! I knew that there would be times that I just couldn't be limited to one cookbook. Tonight was one of those times. I needed to use up some boneless chicken breasts and didn't really feel up to a labor-intensive meal. I asked my friends over on the Cooking Light Bulletin Board for some inspiration. They had loads of good ideas, and I chose Sauteed Chicken with Balsamic Pan Sauce from an old issue of Cooking Light.

In an effort to stay true to the Barefoot Contessa, I included her Sauteed Carrots from Family Style and Mustard-Roasted Potatoes from Barefoot Contessa Cooks at Home. Doesn't it all look good? See how the sauce caresses the chicken? Well, don't believe everything you see. First, I absolve any of my bulletin board friends from responsibility. Operator error resulted in a sauce that was more like vinegar candy than...well...sauce. You don't even want to know what it took to clean the pan!

On a happier note, the carrots and potatoes were excellent. The grainy mustard tossed with the potatoes and onions before roasting lent an intriguing note to the dish. The carrots are "the essence of carrotness" according to Ina, and I have to agree. They saute in a bit of water until crisp-tender, then cook in a sweep of butter for flavor before tossing with the dill and serving.

Today's mail brought yet another cookbook, Stop and Smell the Rosemary, which I scored for a mere $5.00 at the Barnes & Noble online, after-Christmas sale. It looks wonderful, and might be a contender for the next-in-line cookbook for this blog.

Lemons and Parsley and Shrimp--Oh, my!

Tonight's dinner was, again, from Barefoot Contessa: Family Style. Linguine with Shrimp Scampi was accompanied by Zucchini with Parmesan. This was, once again, a great pairing. I put a large skillet on the stove almost as soon as I walked in the door. As the skillet heated, I sliced the onions for the zucchini, my daughter sliced the zucchini. The onions slowly carmelized, then the zucchini were stirred in, browning in two batches. After developing a nice, brown crust, the zucchini were dusted with grated Parmesan and parked in the oven to keep warm.



I also started a large stockpot of water boiling. While the zucchini slowly cooked, we prepped the lemon in all its forms (zest, juice, and slices) for the scampi, minced the garlic, and chopped the parsley. Once the second batch of zucchini came off the stove, I dropped the linguini in the boiling water and started the garlic sizzling in a skillet. Dinner was on the table ten minutes later, and it was glorious. Lots of "Mmmmm's" were heard around the table, and the leftovers are packed for tomorrow's lunches. Without the zucchini, this dinner could truly be a 30-minute meal. As Rachael would say, "Yum-O!"

No blues on Monday

It's amazing what a sense of accomplishment results from something as simple as cooking dinner and feeding your family. I've been too long away from kitchen, burying my need to cook under the busyness of grad school first, then the demands of a new job. There is such sweet satisfaction in the licorice smell of fresh basil, the tangy green of parsley, and the brightness of lemon offset against the sharp bite of Parmesan cheese.

Tonight's dinner, all from Barefoot Contessa: Family Style, was Parmesan Chicken, hearts of romaine with Lemon Vinaigrette, and Provencal Tomatoes. These dishes complimented each other nicely, with the Parmesan in the tomatoes echoing, but not really repeating, the Parmesan in the chicken. It went together fairly quickly once the prep work was done. Somehow, I got my skillet too hot and had a hard time cooling it down, so once the chicken was browned, I put it in the convection oven heated to 325 degrees for about 15 minutes--just for insurance. While the chicken finished in the oven, I cleaned up the kitchen, dressed the greens with the Lemon Vinaigrette, and prepared to plate the meal.

My husband's comment was that the meal just tasted fresh and healthy, and was absolutely correct. I loved the vibrant taste of the vinaigrette against the more solid flavor of the chicken, and spooned some extra over my portion. I'm looking forward to leftovers for lunch tomorrow.

Road Food

We just got back from a trip to Las Vegas with our daughter, son-in-law, and two granddaughters. For some ridiculous reason, I thought it would be a good idea to take some snacks along for the morning and late-night munchies. Apparently, I forgot about the abundance of food available at every turn in Vegas. I spent the day before our trip making the Barefoot Contessa's Lemon Cake, Nielsen-Massey Chocolate Chip Cookies, Cook's Illustrated Lime Bars (a riff on their Lemon Bars), Five-Grain Cookies with Coconut and Cranberries (courtesy of Val on the CLBB), and my own chicken salad, salsa, and sloppy joe recipes.

I suppose this was my latent Christmas-baking gene showing itself, as I did absolutely no baking before the holidays. It seems like there is so much food available then that there's just no joy in adding to the abundance.

The goodies did come in handy on the trip, though, when I broke my foot on the second day. I'd love to tell you how it happened, but you already know...what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas! (Doesn't that sound better than a story about tripping over a sand bag in the under-construction pedestrian area on the strip?) The incident did clip my wings a bit, but with enough pain medication and crutches, I still managed to roam at will.

As I learn more about how to move around Blogger and customize my blog, I'll post recipes and other interesting stuff. For now, it's early to bed and back to work tomorrow after a two-week break. Stay tuned to see what I can stand up long enough to cook this week!

What's the point?

Other than ego, why on earth would I undertake the creation of a blog at this time in my life? As a school administrator, wife, mother, and grandmother of two, my life is busier than I would like, and it seems like my days are all too short.

Perhaps it's the frustrated writing lurking in my heart, or the frustrated cook lurking on the outskirts of my kitchen. I like to believe, however, that it's justification for my ridiculously large (and growing) cookbook collection. I read them all, cover to cover, and find tons of wonderful dishes I want to try in each one...then put it down and move on to the next.

My plan (which is subject to change) is to choose one cookbook at a time, and cook everything in it that interests me. Perhaps enough good meals will help me convince my husband that I really DO need more cookbooks, although my friends at the Cooking Light Bulletin Board have no trouble at all helping me justify my addiciton.

This is not going to be a do-or-die plod through any particular cookbook. I admire the cooks who can do that--I really do. That just isn't me, though. For one, there are too many things I just have no interest in cooking. Take lamb, for instance. Sorry...their faces are just too cute. And quail? I could never eat it, not after watching numerous quail families crossing my backyard, heads down, determination written all over their feathery little bodies, as they charge toward their destination. And fish? Forget it. I do want to begin to add it into my diet, but it's a road I have to walk very, very carefully. It just isn't one of my favorite foods; in fact, in most cases, the more I chew it, the bigger it gets. I've spit out far more fish than I have swallowed.

So, for now, I plan to pick up a cookbook and just cook everything that looks interesting to my family and I--things I think we'll really eat. This blog will record that journey--the successes and the failures. It will also record the deviations from the plan, for knowing myself as I do, there will be many. I look forward to sharing the adventure with you.

I believe I'm going to choose Barefoot Contessa: Family Style as my first challenge. For one, it looks good. And it's a slim volume. It seems realistic. We'll see.