Apartment Dining

I had every intention of posting an Apartment Dining Challenge entry today. The meal was cooked over the weekend, I took plenty of photos, and even promised it in my recent Facebook and Twitter updates. Well, things have been a bit crazy since Monday and in anticipation of my new job starting next week, I decided to escape to the Adirondacks for a few days to recharge and refocus. I completely forgot to grab the AD Challenge photos off of my hard drive, so Tuesday was my first night here and my mother made one of her mother’s dinner staples: rice krispie chicken.

I asked my mother for the recipe, and not only did she provide me with it, she also pulled out my Grandma Mangan’s recipe book (she of giblet gravy fame). It’s a Home & Garden cookbook bursting with small pieces of loose leaf paper, newspaper and magazine clippings, pieces of prepared food packaging, and paper scraps with recipes ranging from spaghetti pie to chicken marsala. She had a separate set of index cards with her own recipes (or those from Dom DeLuise), but I’m fascinated by the recipes from other sources she chose to save over fifty years of cooking.

All of this—along with my lack of a printer for my computer—inspired me to go out and purchase a three-in-one printer/scanner/copier so that I can document these clippings and not have to deal with the Staples Copy Center on a regular basis. I will be spending much of Thursday scanning my favorite items so that I can create a feature here called “Grandma’s Recipes” where I post the clipping, prepare it myself, and share the results.

I wasn’t able to find the actual clipping for the rice krispie chicken, however my mother was able to write it out from memory. » Read the rest of this entry «

I’ve been trying to keep food bills to a minimum the past few months, so Ramsey and I have been eating a lot of chicken and pasta. There are endless pasta variations that can be easily improvised, but I’ve been searching for more ways to prepare chicken beyond my standbys of roasting and pan-searing. A quick flip through my cookbook library yielded a technique I had never tried in my kitchen before: braising. It calls for searing meat and/or vegetables in a bit of oil, then slowly simmering them in flavorful liquid until they’re cooked through. It’s easy, delicious, and best of all, it’s cheap.

» Read the rest of this entry «

Spring Carrots with Apricots and Pistachios from The Splendid Table: A perfect side dish to welcome the spring weather. It also packs a lot of flavor for such an inexpensive dish, as you can easily omit the pistachios.

Homemade gnocchi and marinara sauce: I’ll be posting a full account of this recipe later this week. Surprisingly easy.

Brown Sugar-Brined Chicken: I made a modified version of this Splendid Table recipe when I was unable to track down ancho chilis in my neighborhood. Instead of creating the chili paste, I just mixed a bit of chili powder and extra pepper with the orange zest, juice, garlic, and oil, and then rubbed it underneath the skin. You can tell from the photo a bit of the minced garlic ended up on top of the skin. Whoops.

The overnight brining resulted in a much better roast chicken and I may make it standard pre-roasting practice from now on. Some people complain of it making the meat too salty, but I found it to just make the chicken extra moist.