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The aroma of white wine cooking gets my taste buds going. There is something about it that I know when its cooked delicately that the meal is going to taste fabulous. I've cooked this recipe of Jamie's about 4 or five times by now but never posted it, why? I have no idea but now its time as I made it again last night and it was scrumptious. White wine, leek, chicken, cream... mmm what a fantastic marriage.
Recipe #60 :Chicken and Leek Stroganoff
I've added an onion in the mix to make more sauce and changed the way its cooked slightly. Making it better and better with each time its done and making it more mine. I feel I'm an expert at cooking this now.
Splosh of Extra Virgin Olive oil
nobb of butter
1 large leek (cleaned, quartered and chopped)
1 large onion (sliced in half moons)
2 classes of dry white wine (plus extra if needed)
4 small chicken breasts (sliced into finger sized pieces)
4 handfuls of sliced mushrooms
bunch of parsley (finely chopped)
200mL single or low fat cream
1/2 lemon
1- Heat olive oil and butter in a large frying pan and add the onions, leeks, wine and season with S&P and loosely cover with a lid or piece of foil and cook on medium heat for about 5 min.
2- Add the chicken pieces and cook until the outside of the chicken is no longer pink. (You can add more wine here if it starts looking dry)
3- Sprinkle the mushrooms over the top so it covers the chicken (the mushrooms act as like a lid so the chicken steams a little as well as the mushrooms) then sprinkle the parsley over the top.
4- Stir everything up then add the cream. Bring to a simmer and right before you serve it sprinkle the lemon juice over the top. Season to taste.
5- Serve it with plain rice.
Recipe #59: Perfect Roast Chicken with baked potatoes and spicy greens.
I had been craving Roast Chicken for weeks now and finally FINALLY I got it. The frozen chook spent the day in the fridge but didn’t defrost one bit so it was stuck in the microwave. I know, I know... please don't judge. It came out with bits cooked and ewww it looked hideous. But we we're not going to have hideous chicken for dinner, no not at all. We were having Perfect Roast Chicken. I microwaved two tiny lemons after stabbing them a good few times then stuffed them up its bum with some fresh rosemary, covered the chook in olive oil and lots of S&P. Placed it on top of 3 carrots, an onion and a bulb of garlic which was roughly chopped.
It was then time to go into the oven and cook for 1 hour and 20min. I part boiled the peeled potatoes and scrapped the outsides to make them crunchy, covered them in olive oil and threw them into a foiled tray with a good dowsing of S&P and a handful of garlic cloves. They were then bunged in the oven after the chicken had had about 40min cooking.
This is how I did the next bit because I have a small small oven at home but if your lucky and have a normal sized one or even a large one (oh so jealous!) you can do it your way. Once the chicken is nearly cooked, I swapped the potatoes and chicken around so the potatoes can crunch up and got all my ingredients ready for the greens. Once the potatoes have crunched up; the chicken came out to rest while the gravy was simmering and the spicy greens were steaming. I served it up steamng hot and all that was left to do was... Eat, Laugh and Love.
Spicy greens.
- About a tbs of extra virgin olive oil
- Pinch of chilli flakes
- A handful of frozen peas
- 2 zucchini’s chopped into rough large-ish chunks
- A good handful of green beans
- Small bunch of fresh parsley
(Really you can use any greens you like; this is what we had in the fridge and freezer)
- A glass of white wine
- S&P
- Nob of butter
- squeeze of lemon juice (optional)
How To: Heat up a frying pan on medium heat and add some extra virgin olive oil. Add the chilli flakes for about a min or until you can smell them then add the greens (all of them inc parsley) and white wine. Give it a good stir and S&P-ing then add a nob of butter and place a lid on it to steam. Turn the heat down to a low simmer here until the wine has nearly cooked away and the butter has melted. Quick taste and add more seasoning (you can add the lemon juice here) and enjoy.
Jamie's Gravy How To: Take your chicken out of the pan it cooked in and spoon out some of the fat if there is too much. Stick the tray over the hob and start to squash all the goodies that the chicken was sitting on into a mush. Add 2 tbs of plain flour and stir until all cooked away. A splash of white wine and cook the liquid off then add some water. Keep on the hob for about 5-10 min until thickened and tasting amazing. Season to taste.
mmm yum :)
Last night I cooked Chicken Rogan Josh. It should have been with lamb but the only lamb we have was lamb chops and I couldn’t be bothered to cut the meat off the bone. Jamie says it would be ok with chicken so I trusted him and even though it was delish I think Lamb would have made it even better. You need a stronger meat then chicken for this curry.
Recipe #53 and #54: Chicken Rogan Josh (with home made curry paste)
I had a helper in the kitchen last night who ground the toasted spices into a powder for me with the tiny tiny mortar and pestle. (I love the mortar and pestle from the movie Julie and Julia; the one Paul Child gives Julia on Valentines day. Hmmm I love that movie and Julia Child. She had such romance with Paul, I love that he sat in the kitchen while she cooked away. Sorry back on track...) Rogan Josh curry paste. The recipe for this past can be found at Jamie's website.
First I toasted coriander seeds, cumin seeds and black peppercorns and gave them to my handy helper for the night; Tris, who ground them into a fine powder for me. They went in the blender with: roasted capsicums, ginger, garlic, coriander, paprika, smoked paprika, turmeric, fresh red chilli (seeds and all), garam marsala, salt, peanut oil and tomato paste and whizzed until it formed a paste.
Next was to get on with the actual curry. Sauté onions, fresh red chilli (seeds and all), fresh ginger, bay leaves and coriander stalks in peanut oil with a nob of butter until the onions are translucent. Add the chicken (or lamb which I would advise) and cook until slightly browned, add some balsamic vinegar, S&P, can of diced tomatoes then the curry paste and cook for about 2 min until fragrant. Next add 800mL of chicken stock (or water) and a couple of handfuls of red lentils and cook for about 40 min for chicken and split lentils or an hour for lamb and whole lentils. Tase to see if more salt is needed.
Serve with basmati rice and home made condiments of yoghurt and cucumber. Mmmm EAT, LAUGH and LOVE it.
**Heads up: Even better the next day!
No I have not dropped off the planet... just taken a trip to Vancouver.
I discovered the best bookshop while being here which is around the corner from where we are currently staying (at the beautiful Fizz, Duncan and Page's place). Its called:
Books to Cooks
Its a whole shop of just cook books and it has a kitchen at the back and they do cooking lessons. It's owned by a lady who I was very fortunate to meet; Barbara-Jo who also signed a copy of her latest cookbook. Cooking for me and Sometimes You. I am in the middle of reading it and love it. It's a book about how she moved to Paris for a month... How much better can that get???
I haven't done much cooking while I'm here but Mari and I cooked a roast chicken the other night. We smothered it in a Sage, lemon, garlic and butter. It's turned out pretty good I think. No one complained so it was a successful dinner (unless they were all too polite) I will defiantly make it again back home but I think it will always hold the memory of Vancouver and thinking the chicken shop lady made us buy way too much chicken. Just the right amount it turned out to be.
The Fish taco's here are fantastic. I cannot believe we don't get them in Australia! I am going to have to test out some recipes back home and try and replicate this delicious Salmon one I had here from a small fish and chip shop near Granville Island. Oh and I love Granville island. Its fantastic with all the fresh food and smoked meats and deli goods. I have definately put on weight over here :)
Its our last day tomorrow. Its going to be a sad day leaving Fizz... again. It doesn't help that we're going from a lovely sunny country where we have seen not a drop of rain back to winter... cold and raining where most of our friends are overseas somewhere exotic.
I best be off to bed now.... Nearly finished packing... grr I hate packing.
p.s. The 30th of June came and whooshed past me. My new aim is to cook, laugh and enjoy life.
Tonight for dinner I cooked (recipe #50 and #51) Mexican-style corn and Parmesan Chicken Breasts with Crispy Posh Ham. It was an incredibly easy dinner.
You slice the chicken but not all the way through, just to make scores on one side then you sprinkle over pepper, fresh thyme, lemon zest and parmesan cheese. Top with prosciutto and olive oil. Cover with glad and smash with a hammer/mallet till the chicken is 1cm thick. Heat a frying pan and add the chicken prosciutto side down and cook for 3min. the turn and cook until cooked through.
While the chicken is cooking, cook your corn (I used the microwave- mum style). Chop your chilli finely, grate your parmesan and spread both over a large plate and sprinkle with pepper and salt. When the corn is cooked add butter to it and make sure it melts and overs the corn. Roll the buttered corn in the cheese and chilli.
Serve Chicken and corn on a hot plate (we also had a baked potato with dinner) and ENJOY! Dinner was delish I just wish I didn't have crackers and cheese when I got home.
**do not add salt to the chicken as the posh ham is very salty.
Recipe #37 and 38: Crunchy Garlic Chicken with Baked Creamy Leeks.
This was last weeks dinner and it all went surprisingly well. I made the garlic crumbs, chopped the leeks and started cooking them while the chicken defrosted. Once the leeks were cooked on the stove they were mixed with cheese and cream and baked for 20min. While the leeks were baking the chicken breasts were crumbed and fried.
Ok so admit I over cooked the first side of the chicken a little too much as a have a fear of under cooked chicken so I seem to over cook it all the time just incase ;)
Dinner was delish even with the crunchy crunchy garlic chicken. Leeks turned out lovely and came out of the oven bubbling and oozy as they should. Mum even licked the serving spoon when we were clearing the table so they must have impressed her :)
I made just as much mess making Jamie's Chicken Fajitas as eating them.
Recipe #17- Tonights dinner had to be a quick one as netball season is back on. The worst feeling is being full and then having to run around for two twenty minute halves. Ew.
So I flicked through JMOF and went for one of his 'Twenty-minute Meals'. He quotes 19min for Chicken Fajitas. Don't even ask how I started it cooking 5:30pm and we were eating at 6:30pm. Thank goodness I underestimated myself and allowed enough time. If I had taken Jamie's 19min advice I would still be trying to eat fajitas.
I chopped the chicken, capsicum and onions and put them in a bowl with smoked paprika, cumin, lime juice and olive oil. Next was to start the salsa. I needed 15 cherry tomatoes, a bunch of fresh coriander and one fresh chilli. We had the fresh chilli... normal tomatoes and dried coriander leaves. That will have to do.
Now Jamie says serve it with a tub of bought guacamole but I thought no. We have fresh avocados at home and i've made guacamole before it will be easy peasy. Yes well its easy peasy when you have more then half an avocado to use. The other one was so hard I could have knocked someone out with it. I attempted to cut through it with a sharp knife to nearly only cut my hand off and not even make the avocado budge. And yes i was using an avocado not some other mysterious fruit.
So in with the half of an avo went some onions, yoghurt, vinegar (weird but wonderful!) and tomato. I made half an avo go round enough!
The chicken and capsicum mixture then had to be put on a griddle pan and cooked. The smell of the smoked paprika is still hanging around the house. Feeling slightly ill right about now.
I chopped lettuce and cucumber to go with everything even though Jamie doesn't say so. It was served on the balcony with mozzies having just a big of a feast as we were. With no cheese. Yes no cheese Erin!! For some reason it slipped my mind and eyes when reading the recipe.
Maybe I do need to go back to the judgmental optometrist and get new glasses.
Recipe #11- Chicken Chow Mein last night. Wondering what the snot, slime and friends means? let me explain. I chopped the garlic, spring onions, ginger and chilli as Jamie asks. The chicken was defrosting and the noodles were sitting their packet ready to go. Next step was to pick the leaves of the coriander and chop the stalks. Out came the fresh coriander from the fridge... 'Mmmuuummmm!!!' Lets just say it did not like sitting in the fridge over the past couple days. It was half snot and half coriander.
While mum sorted the snotty coriander I got the mushrooms out of the fridge to start chopping. When I pulled one out of its box I not only had a mushroom in my hand but also a little creepy crawly friend too. 'Mmmuuuuuummmm!!' So mum sorted the slimy mushrooms and my little friend went straight into the compost. After the Snot, slime and friends catastrophe everything was ready to go for some wok action. Except the fact that the only bit of sauce used in Jamie's Chicken Chow Mein is soy sauce it was the only sauce we didn't have at home. So off Dad went -as he so often does when I am half way through a recipe and realise I don't have everything to make it- to the shops to get some soy sauce. He came back after failing at the local Shell to then be successful at the Asian grocers across the road.
Dinner was served and eaten within 15 min of getting the soy sauce in the door.
Recipe # 7 & 8- Korma Chicken (with Jamie style homemade curry paste). I had no alphabet songs going through my head staring at the spice section in Coles yesterday.
I made my own ground almonds for the curry which worked well and we added dried coriander leaves in stead of coriander stalks and half a red chilli instead of a green one. I avoided putting my fingers in my mouth this time while chopping the chilli but we did have our mouths burning within the 2nd mouthful!
Hmm there is still Vindaloo to cook.... haha we might have more then our mouths burning with that one :)
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