(Let's pretend I got an email from a fan asking me what to do with leftover BBQ chicken? OK? Cool. )
6/9/11
buffalo chicken salad
The other day I got an email from a fan asking me if I had any great ideas for leftover BBQ chicken. Oh I sure do! Leftover BBQ chicken makes the best buffalo chicken salad--perfect for those nights when you do not want to cook during the 1000 degree heat waves. And if you're like me, and love spicy buffalo sauce with cold blue cheese crumbles in your chicken salad, then this would be the salad for you. What a great question. Thanks for the email and question! :-) I hope this salad is exactly what you're looking for.
Who else had a heat wave? We did. It wasn't so much hot, but really humid here on cape cod. With humidity my appetite goes away. I just want to eat ice cream. But sadly I cannot eat ice cream every minute err day. So when I saw, sitting in the back of the fridge, a nice big bowl of leftover BBQ chicken. I knew it was going to be transformed into the best buffalo chicken salad ever. Why? Because I LUCKILY had all the ingredients in the fridge. LOL
Please note: in the pic I have Trader Joe's mayo, DO NOT use this. Use Hellmans instead. Hellmans went better than the slightly sweet Trader Joes. OK?
buffalo chicken salad
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Please note these measurements are to my liking; you may need more or less depending on likeness on level or heat and/or mayo. Also if you don't have as much leftover chicken you might need to scale down. As with anything, it’s best to taste test as you go along.
Leftover BBQ chicken (about 2-3 breasts), cold & chopped
¼ cup red onion, chopped
½ cup or more of broccoli slaw (you can use regular cole slaw too)
3-5 TB Hellmans mayo
¼ cup (or more) blue cheese, chopped
2-4 TB hot sauce
Salt & pepper to taste, if needed
Lettuce for decoration and/or extra crunch
Chop up leftover BBQ chicken. In a bowl mix the mayo, hot sauce, blue cheese crumbles. Taste and see what it needs. Add in the red onions and chopped chicken, then the broccoli slaw. Mix well.
Serve on lettuce or rolls.
6/5/11
teriyaki beef strips
I literally just made this for sunday dinner. Never would have thought to post it and share with you. Why? It's one of those dishes you make a lot and never think to post. But my cheerleading/peanut gallery/support team at home thinks otherwise and encouraged me to post this one. It sure is tasty, that sweet sticky glaze that forms on the tender beef while it's being grilled.... Oh yeah. So why not share something this good with others. Plus it's super easy; a snap to pull together. And everything can be done on the grill--those are my kind of easy dishes.
Serving grilled beef; I firmly believe if the meat is grilled and well-seasoned all you really need with it are grilled veggies and bread for all those juices. Okay potatoes too, but I'm kind of carb-watching.
And yes, I always plate my food kind of fancy. Ask hubby. Like the scene in the movie "The Birdcage" starring Robin Williams and Nathan Lane where they are trying to dress over nathan lanes character to be more manly, putting him in a suit so he won't appear to be so flamboyant. Clearly the suit looks fine until the camera pans down to the feet where he is wearing pink socks. And Nathan Lane turns and says: "Too much?" "Well, one does need a hint of color!". Love love love that part and adore the movie. It's how I feel about plating food. One does need their food to be presentable, fashionable, more desirable? Too much? I could be in a buffet line, and I would make sure to arrange the food in a colorful fashion so each bite of food is well blended with the other foods on the plate. Ask my hubby, at times while we are dining out, I've been guilty of taking his plate, rearranging the proteins with the veggies and making sure to drizzle on the right amount of sauce or even if there is too much sauce scraping some off to the side for later, should it be needed. I know, bad habit. I just love to properly plate foods and desserts. It makes it more appealing. Perhaps in a past life I was a trained culinary chef....yes, I had to be.
So with this dish, its so simple. You must make this this summer. All I ask is that you marinade your beef at least 5 hours. It's needs to get nice and tasty or as Emeril says "happy happy".
teriyaki beef strips
print recipe
7 strips sirloin beef (about 1 ½ to 2 lbs)
¾- 1 cup of soy sauce
1 & ½ TB of chopped garlic
3 TB of fresh ginger root, chopped
¼ cup plus 2 TB packed dark brown sugar
2-3 TB honey
Couple dashes of ground black pepper
Cook notes: If you want it spicy, just add a few pinches of red chili pepper flakes to the marinade. Also serve with grilled bread. Dip the bread (quickly) in some of the cold marinade then grill. So good. Put the grilled bread on the bottom of the plate to sop up the juices from the grilled beef. I’ve also taken the marinade and reduced it down for a fabulous side sauce. I've also broiled this steak--it cooks very fast so literally watch it. I've also grilled them up in a cast iron pan, about 5 minutes per side. I've never fried them; steak tips don't stay that moist when frying unless they are in tiny strips and get cooked very hot and fast.
Mix all ingredients in a glass or ceramic dish. Mix well until sugar is dissolved. Then add in beef strips. Cover and place in fridge. Every 3 hours turn beef over. Marinade at least 5 hours or longer.
When ready to eat just grill until done, about 4 minutes each side for med-rare.
Serve with grilled veggies. Any kind of veggie really will do: red, yellow, orange peppers, red onions, asparagus, corn, etc…
When ready to eat just grill until done, about 4 minutes each side for med-rare.
Serve with grilled veggies. Any kind of veggie really will do: red, yellow, orange peppers, red onions, asparagus, corn, etc…
5/31/11
chicago dog err sausage
Summer is here. And wow was it hot and humid in the northeast. Here on cape cod we were slammed with extreme weather very fast. Our spring meant we literally went from electric blankets to A/C in a matter of days. Wild. When it gets too hot to cook inside I like to go outside and grill. Did anyone cook this weekend? Lately we've been eating a lot of ice cream for lunch and dinner; humidity when it gets to 100% and a dew point of 70 or higher literally zaps your appetite. But I did manage to sneak in these Chicago dogs. OK they aren't the authentic Chicago Dog but its kind of close. I first saw this recipe over at my buddy Nick's site: macheesemo. I tend to make a lot of what he makes. He's got good taste and easy to follow recipes. I need to know how he stays so thin though....
Instead of using hot dogs I used sausages with a nice char on them. I know I know it's not really a true Chicago dog, but then again I never ever follow the rules. If you want the original way head over to see Nick. He even made the relish from scratch. Good man. If you like charred sausages, sweet pepper relish on your dog then I'm your best bet. Whatever you choose....please make sure you butter and toast them rolls people! Makes all the difference.
chicago dog (my way)
kielbasa, Italian sausage or beef franks, grilled with nice crispy char
mayonnaise
grainy mustard
pickles, sliced
tomatoes, sliced
white onions, diced
sweet pepper relish
celery salt
buttered & grilled hot dog rolls
grill up your sausages
butter and grill up your hot buns
layer the buns in this order:
mayonnaise, mustard, pickles, tomatoes, white onions, sweet pepper relish, and then a sprinkling of celery salt.
Serve with baked beans. Enjoy.
5/26/11
chocolate cake w/ olive oil and sea salt
One of the great joys of blogging is the down time I have with scoping out new favorite bloggers. Granted I don't get a lot of down time, but when I do my ideal situation: 6pm or 7pm, dishes are done, everyone is fed, jazz on the internet radio--time to look at other food blogs and food writing websites. I get great inspiration from other food blogs; love seeing new photos, new techniques, other bloggers taking some old recipe, jazzing it up with a new twist or several twists. Honestly I get all my inspiration if I come across a really good food photo. For me inspiration starts with the eyes, then the stomach, then seeing if the flavors I want to add in will match/coexist happily. This chocolate cake with olive oil and sea salt was inspired by sprinklebakes.com When I saw that she had done a sea theme by baking the cakes in shells I was hooked. I didn't use seas shells because I wanted to make sure I liked the whole baking sweets with olive oil first. Admittedly I was very skeptical about using olive oil in anything sweet or baking related. Not any more. The olive oil really does pair very nice with dark chocolate. Not sure about milk chocolate, so stick with the 70% (or higher) dark chocolate. The next time I make these I will try them with the sea shells and the added extra touch of drizzling them with a last coat of olive oil before serving.
Have a good Memorial Day weekend everyone! What are you doing?
chocolate cake with sea salt & olive oil
adapted from sprinklebakes.com
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Cook notes: I wanted to try and make brownie-like cake. See my changes. And I used a chocolate Ganache instead of the chocolate sauce. This is a very moist cake; it was very hard to cut these into perfect little squares for the photo. If you want to make this the original way please visit sprinklebakes.com
Cake:
7oz. dark chocolate (minimum 70% cocoa solids)
3/4 cup plus 2 tbsp unsalted butter (14 tbsp. or 1 3/4 US sticks)
4 medium eggs
3/4 cups granulated sugar
Scant 1/2 cup all purpose flour (I used 1 cup flour)
1 1/2 ts baking powder
Extra virgin olive oil
Sea salt
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
Brush the entire bottom and sides of a brownie pan (8x8 or 9x9) with generous amount of olive oil; set aside.
Melt chocolate in a heat proof bowl over a pan of simmering water.
Add butter and stir until butter is melted and well combined with the chocolate.
Remove bowl from simmering water and let stand until later needed.
In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine the eggs and sugar together and mix on high speed until mixture turns pale and doubles in volume.
Decrease mixer speed and add the flour a little at a time, then the baking powder.
While mixer is running, pour the chocolate mixture in a thin stream into the egg and sugar mixture.
Mix until well blended. Pour batter into brownie pan
Bake for 25-30 minutes. When cake is done, it will form a brownie-like crust on top and a toothpick tester should come out clean.
(Instead of the chocolate sauce I used a dark chocolate Ganache: 1 cup of dark chocolate melted with 1-2 TB of heavy cream whip until nice & glossy)
Chocolate sauce:
1/4 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup half and half
3 TB sugar
2 TB unsalted butter
4 oz. dark chocolate
1 ts vanilla extract
In a medium saucepan, stir together cream, half and half, sugar and butter.
Place pan over medium-high heat and stir to dissolve the sugar and melt butter.
When sugar and butter has melted, add chocolate and whisk until melted and smooth.
Add vanilla extract and whisk again.
Remove from heat. Let the mixture stand for a few minutes and then whisk again.
(This is a good all-purpose chocolate sauce and can be stored in refrigerator for up to two weeks.)
Assembly:
Spoon a small amount of chocolate sauce/or ganache over cake, smoothing it to the edges with the back of a spoon. Lightly sprinkle cakes with sea salt (don't use a heavy hand with this if using coarse salt).
Drizzle cakes with olive oil. (I did not do this)
5/23/11
white chocolate-cranberry quick bread w/ lemon glaze
Quick and easy coming right up! And let me just say this was super tasty too. I know we all love our Trader Joes, but what I love more is a bargain AND something super-tasty. This bread when I first baked it was ok, just a little dry, and a little bland. They do put a lot of cranberries in the mix, thankfully. I decided to jazz it up a bit, with white chocolate chips since they, when melted have a nice buttery taste. Perfect! And then the gentle lemon glaze made it fabulous. You simply have to try this. This is the perfect last minute gift for whatever pops up. They'll never know it was from a box. Never never know I swear. My friends didn't--well they do now.
A big congrats to the winner of the giveaway. It was Valerie, lucky #99, She won the over-sized boxes of Guylian Chocolates and the amazing Nespresso machine. Congrats Val! Let us know what espresso and chocolate creations you make with it? What a fabulous machine. A very special "thank you" to Guylian Chocolates for donating these prizes.
I am working on getting another BIG PRIZE giveaway coming up soon. Only the biggest and best gifts for my fans!
white chocolate-cranberry quick bread w/ lemon glaze
print recipe
1 box of Trader Joe’s Cranberry Bread
(plus all the ingredients the box direction calls for)
½ cup – ¾ cup good quality white choco chips
Glaze
1 large lemon
3-4 TB of confectioners sugar, sifted
Cook notes: the glaze is very very mild. I only wanted a hint of lemon on there as the bread is very sweet on it’s on; so I did not use a strong glaze. Feel free to use whatever you want. The white chocolate chips make this cake very moist and almost buttery-like tasting. You could probably do this in a bundt pan, just reduce the cooking time by 5 – 10 minutes.
Mix cranberry bread according to box directions. Preheat oven according to box directions. Grease up or butter up a loaf pan, pour ¾ batter into pan, sprinkle the white chocolate chips, then pour on the remaining ¼ batter. Tap pan to get out excess air. Bake according to box directions or until cake tester comes out clean.
Let cool in pan about 10 minutes then flip onto wire rack. Prepare the glaze by mixing the lemon juice with the confectioners sugar. It’s a very mild and gentle glaze. If you want a stronger/thicker glaze then add in more confectioners sugar and/or lemon juice.
white chocolate-cranberry quick bread w/ lemon glaze
print recipe
1 box of Trader Joe’s Cranberry Bread
(plus all the ingredients the box direction calls for)
½ cup – ¾ cup good quality white choco chips
Glaze
1 large lemon
3-4 TB of confectioners sugar, sifted
Cook notes: the glaze is very very mild. I only wanted a hint of lemon on there as the bread is very sweet on it’s on; so I did not use a strong glaze. Feel free to use whatever you want. The white chocolate chips make this cake very moist and almost buttery-like tasting. You could probably do this in a bundt pan, just reduce the cooking time by 5 – 10 minutes.
Mix cranberry bread according to box directions. Preheat oven according to box directions. Grease up or butter up a loaf pan, pour ¾ batter into pan, sprinkle the white chocolate chips, then pour on the remaining ¼ batter. Tap pan to get out excess air. Bake according to box directions or until cake tester comes out clean.
Let cool in pan about 10 minutes then flip onto wire rack. Prepare the glaze by mixing the lemon juice with the confectioners sugar. It’s a very mild and gentle glaze. If you want a stronger/thicker glaze then add in more confectioners sugar and/or lemon juice.
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