Tag: recipe

Citrus Asian Chicken

Inspired by the soy hoison orange salmon meal I make I wanted to make a chicken version. Who doesn’t love chicken right? And a roast chicken is a classic favorite because you get that tender meat with crispy skin.

So lets do this.

For the marinade, we don’t even need to make it pretty. Also long as we can fuse all the flavors into the chicken, we win! Smash and peel the garlic, cut off the roots and smash the green onions. Don’t even need to chop it! Just release those flavors!

Wash then peel some zest off one orange, and one lemon.

Throw the zest, garlic, green onions into the bag. Pour in the liquid ingredients. Give it a good shake, and taste it to see if it’s something you are proud of.

Add the chicken to the bag, seal and mix, shake, massage. Get all the flavors in there. Lay it down in a pan and refrigerate for a couple hours (the longer the better) and remember to flip the bag over halfway through, for even soaking.

Citrus Asian Chicken

Ingredients
2 oranges
1 lemon
3 stalks of green onion
4 cloves of garlic, smashed
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup rice vinegar
1/4 cup honey
4 chicken thighs or breast
Vegetable oil

Directions
Wash and zest strips of one of the oranges and lemon. Place those in a gallon size zippered plastic bag. Squeeze the juices of the citrus in the bag. Trim the green onions, cut in half and smash the white parts. Add to the bag, along with the liquid ingredients. Shake the bag and taste. Alter to your taste.

Rinse and pat dry your chicken thighs. Add to ziplock and marinate for 2-8 hours, turning halfway.

Preheat your oven to 425F. Stick your cast iron in the oven (empty) for 10 minutes to get it nice and hot.

Remove your chicken thighs from the bag and lay them in a pan to let the marinade drip off a little. Brush the skin with a thin layer of vegetable oil. Remove the hot skillet from the oven, and place the thighs, skin side down onto the skillet and return to the oven for 20-30 minutes.

While your chicken is baking, pour the leftover marinade into a small saucepan, discarding the chunks of citrus, garlic and green onion. Bring to boil over medium high heat, then reduce to a medium low simmer. Taste and season accordingly. If you want it sweeter, add honey, if you want it saltier add soy sauce.

After 20 minutes, check on your chicken. If you think it needs a little more time to brown the skin side give it a little, if not, let’s flip! Pull out skillet. Add about 2 tablespoons of water to help loosen the skin from the bottom of the pan. Flip the chicken over, and baste with the marinade that you turned into a sauce! Cook for another 10-15 minutes, until chicken is done.

Let your sauce thicken, then serve chicken with sauce over rice.

Posted on by miemo 0

Jammin’ Jambalaya

What a cliche name, I know, but it really is jamming. And delicious. So delicious, that AFTER my mardi gras party, I had to make another round to enjoy (since I didn’t get to at the party). And I made it a little spicier, which I didn’t do for the party since I was feeding a large group of people with a different range of spice levels.

So let’s get cooking!

Get the ingredients ready. The divine trinity in cajun cooking is celery, onions and green bell pepper. This is the base for the flavor in both etouffee and gumbo as well! For jambalaya I’ve got those three, plus garlic, tomatoes and a medium grain rice.

Emeril used olive oil. I used butter. Cook the onions, celery and green onions in the butter for about 4 minutes, when the onions turn clear.

Then add the garlic, tomatoes, hot sauce and Worcestershire sauce. Stir until well mix. Then add the rice.

After rice is mixed in well, slowly add chicken broth. Simmer over medium until rice is tender. While this is happening, I dice the chicken breast, and chop the shrimp then add the crawfish tails in the same bowl, and mix well with cajun seasoning, you can you Tony’s or Louisiana brand creole seasoning. Emeril also has a recipe for his bayou blast.

You can find the recipe here.

 

Posted on by miemo 0

Meatless Quesadilla

Remember how I am trying to eat less meat, and attempting to only eat meat on the weekends? Yeah I’m struggling. But this is one of the deliciously simple, quick meatless meals I made. Here’s how:

Enjoy when done! You can added any kind of cheese you like, I also threw in a slice of pepper jack for an added kick of flavor. I don’t like to eat the garlic, so you can just discard that (that’s why I leave it whole, and smashed versus mincing) or put it in someone’s quesadilla that wants it!

Meatless Quesadillas

Ingredients
4 white mushrooms, sliced
1/4 of a medium onion, sliced
1 clove of garlic, smashed or minced
1 tbsp of butter or olive oil
1-2 tsp adobo seasoning
cheeses of your choice
2 flour tortillas

Directions
Melt butter, or heat olive oil in a skillet. Saute onions and mushrooms with adobo seasoning until mushrooms are cooked and onions are clear and caramelized. Remove mushrooms and onions from pan and set aside on a plate. Keep the remaining butter in the pan.

Add the tortilla to the pan, put desired cheese on one side, then top with onions and mushrooms. Fold over the opposite side and the the cheese melt and seal. Then flip the quesadilla to brown the other side. Repeat this with the second tortilla.

Posted on by miemo 0

Homemade Funnel Cakes

This happened, at about 11:40pm. My dear little brother was craving funnel cakes so bad, that he was starting to barter for me to make them. I don’t even remember the last time I had funnel cake. I prefer my deep fried and sugar powdered goodness to come in the form of a beignet. When I think of funnel cakes, I think of my summer with a theme park season pass.

Anyhooo. I was a little daunted with the idea of making it though. Funnel cakes, there’s got to be some kind of difficulty to it right? Or else people would make it everyday instead of eating it only at county fairs and carnivals? Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

I had everything to make it with in my cupboards. So simple, and quick! Whisk together your wet and dry ingredients, put it in a squeeze bottle, squirt into a design in hot oil…

..et voila! You have funnel cake. Dry on paper towels and sprinkle on powdered sugar. Enjoy while hot!

Homemade Funnel Cakes

Ingredients:

1 egg
2/3 cup milk
2 Tablespoons sugar
1 1/4 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder

Directions
In a small deep pot, heat about two cups of oil over medium-high heat until hot.

While that is heating, beat egg and milk. Mix all the dry ingredients in a separate bowl and slowly add to the wet ingredients, whisk until smooth.

Using a funnel, a squeeze bottle, or a ziplock bag with the corner snipped, drop into hot oil working from center outwards in an overlapping pattern. Flip until evenly browned on both sides. Set on a plate with paper towels to catch excess oil. Serve with powdered sugar

Posted on by miemo 0

Chili Oil

I don’t really know how to describe this condiment, other than its a spicy garlicky oil used to dip stuff in or stir into your soups. My mom always had a jar in the spice cupboard. I don’t really eat A LOT of spicy (shocking I know), but I guess I do prefer things more spicy than your average American, I’ve got cajun roots after all!

Going through my emails of recipes that my maman has sent me through the years, there were two things I haven’t made yet. Suki yaki, and this. Obviously I chose to do this chili oil first because that other sauce looks daunting (pickled garlic!??)

Anyway, this is my interpretation of my mom’s recipe. Enjoy!

Chili Oil

Ingredients
Dried Whole Red Asian Chili Peppers, enough to make ½ cup when ground
4-5 garlic large cloves, smashed
1 Cup of Vegetable Oil

Directions
Grind the chili peppers finely in your food processor until there is about ½ cup to use. Smash the 4-5 garlic cloves (your choice, I prefer 5 for a stronger garlic flavor) in a mortar and pestle or with the back of your knife.

Heat the oil in a saucepan over high. Add the garlic. When the garlic turns golden, remove saucepan from heat. Burnt garlic is bitter. Don’t cook it too long. Let stand for 5 minutes, then stir in the ground chili pepper.

The longer it sits the better it tastes. When cool, store in a tightly closed jar with your spices.

 

Posted on by miemo 0