Monday, Monday...Some recipes for this week

I remembered I had to make the Cream of Celery Condensed Soup before I made the Curried Beef Loaf for tonight's dinner, so here it is.  This is the recipe from The Joy of Cooking, Bobbs-Merrill 

Company, Inc., Indianapolis/NY, (1931) 1981, 23rd printing

Cream of Celery Soup

1 T. butter

1 c. or more chopped celery with leaves

⅓ c. sliced onion

2 c. chicken or vegetable stock

1½ c. milk

1½ T. cornstarch

½ c. cold water

Melt the butter.  Add the celery and onion and sauté about 2 minutes.   Pour in the chicken stock and simmer 10 minutes.  Strain the soup.  Add the milk and bring to the boiling point.  Dissolve the cornstarch in the water.  Add to the hot soup gradually.  Bring to the boiling point.  Stir and simmer about 1 more minute.  Makes 4 cups.

Lorri’s Hack for making Condensed Cream of Celery Soup

Follow the recipe but use 1 c. of chicken or vegetable stock.  When you strain the soup, strain through a food mill and process the solids and add to the soup to use as a thickening agent.  Also only add ½ c. of milk to the stock.   Continue as directed afterward.  This gives you a bit more than a can of condensed soup to work with.  For a standard recipe you will use 10 ½ oz. or 1 ⅓ cups.

So I make the soup before I make the Meatloaf recipe so it is ready to go.

Here is Dinner Monday...Curry Beef Loaf

Curry Beef Loaf

2 lb. hamburger

1 t. salt

¼ t. pepper

¼ c. rice

10 ½ oz. can cream of celery soup

1 egg

¼ c. water

1 t. curry powder

¼ c. onion

1 T. parsley, chopped

Preheat the oven to 350°.  Combine the beef, salt, pepper, rice, ½ of the soup, egg, curry powder, onion, and parsley.  Mix thoroughly.  Pack into a greased 9 x 5” pan or cast iron skillet.  Spread the remainder of the soup over the top of the loaf.  Bake for 1 ½ hours.  Serves 6

The chicken was great!

The Chicken was great!  It needs some adjustments, though.  The last time I made this, chicken breasts had to be much smaller.  I seem to remember that if I bought 2 pounds of chicken breasts I probably got 5 breast halves.  Not anymore, 3.5 lbs yielded 5 pieces.  I kind of planned that way, but I still have to work on the size of my pieces.  I cut the chicken breast halves in half again.  I think I should have sliced so the pieces were thinner.  I needed to add 10 minutes to the baking time for the thicker pieces.

This is the cut up chicken...it's huge!

 This is the lovely curry-lime butter that will be stuffed into the chicken

Here is the finished product!  MMM!

I'm still learning how to work with the camera on my phone, but I think I'm getting more comfortable with it.    

I cracked open my two eggs to prepare my egg wash for the chicken coating and look what happened!

Yup, you guessed it, a double yolk!  I haven't seen one of these since I was about 10!  It happened a lot with brown eggs when I was a kid growing up.  In New England the saying was "Brown eggs are local eggs, local eggs are fresh eggs."  I still prefer brown eggs and when the price is no more than 30 cents difference, I'll buy them.

And speaking of pictures, while I was preparing my massive amount of chicken, I ran out of bread crumbs and egg wash for the coating on said chicken.  I went to the fridge and this is what I found. 

So again, reaching back to my frugal upbringing, I knew most of these eggs were fine.  I had to find out which of any of them needed to be discarded.  I filled up my 8 cup measuring cup with water and put the whole dozen eggs in the water, one at a time. Not until I got to the last three, did any of them float.  

I took out the eggs on the bottom, and yes those 3 eggs were the only ones that floated.  If they float, they flunk and they get tossed out!

The rescued eggs were put back in the carton and I labeled them 1/14/17 so I would know when they were tested.

I knew I could use one of these eggs for the rest of my chicken coating.  I measured more bread crumbs and proceeded with the second tray of chicken breasts.  I put them in the oven after dinner and wrapped them in heavy duty foil like I did with the 3 remaining pieces from dinner.  They will be served on the 28th for dinner.  The great thing is I have 9 of them and that means they will work for lunch as well on other days. :)

I'll be back later with the recipe for tomorrow, Curry Beef Loaf, including my recipe for cream of celery soup.  There was a time when you couldn't get this condensed soup at the stores I frequented in Chicago.  Because of that, I adapted the recipe from my copy of The Joy of Cooking I received as a wedding present in 1982.  I'll have that recipe too.  

Wednesday's dinner was so awesome!

The Chicken Korma was awesome!  The chicken was perfectly done and the sauce was so yummy.  It was not overly spicy and I think Miss K would like this now that her palate has changed and matured a bit.  The adjustments I would make are this:  Cut the liquid in half and increase the chickpea flour if necessary. By this I mean the decrease the heavy cream by 1 cup.  There was so much gravy that I had enough for 8-10 servings.  This could have been served in bowls as a soup like meal with plenty of rice underneath.  If you were going to serve it that way, then keep the proportions as they are.

This is my second picture from my new smartphone.  It's still a bit awkward for me, but I'm getting the hang of it.  My kids are happy I've crossed over.  My old phone protected me from so much...

Anyway, I did a meal swap for tonight.  We had a 2 day conference to go to for coaching, so cooking was not in the game plan for yesterday.  I'll make the Baked Chicken Breasts with Curry-Lime Butter tonight.  I'll be back later with the outcome.

The ITCCCA conference was good, we gleaned a couple of things we'll put in our warm ups and core workouts as well as ideas on other ways to use equipment we already have.  Glad we went.

Chicken Korma!

Wednesday is Chicken Korma.  The recipe we use comes from Indian:  A Collection of Over 100 Essential Recipes, Parragon Publishing, Bath, UK, 2008.  It is a yummy dish that we love at our house.  This is not overly hot but very flavorful.  I serve this over rice, and usually with, you guessed it, peas.

Chicken Korma
1 chicken, weighing 3 lb.
1 c. butter
3 onions, thinly sliced
1 garlic clove, crushed
1 inch piece fresh ginger, grated
1 t. mild chili powder
1 t. ground turmeric
1 t. ground coriander
½ t. ground cardamom
½ t. ground cinnamon
½ t. salt
1 T. chickpea flour
½ c. milk
2 c. heavy cream
fresh cilantro leaves to garnish
freshly cooked rice, to serve

Put the chicken into a large pan, cover with water and simmer for 30 minutes.  Remove from the heat, lift the chicken, and set aside to cool.  Reserve ½ c. of the cooking liquid.  Remove and discard the skin and bones.  Cut the flesh into bite-size pieces.

Heat the butter in a large pan over medium heat.  Add the onions and garlic and cook, stirring, for 3 minutes, or until softened. Add the ginger, chili powder, turmeric, coriander, cardamom, cinnamon and salt and cook for an additional 5 minutes. Add the chicken and the reserved broth.  Cook for 2 minutes.

Blend the chickpea flour with a little of the milk and add to the pan, then stir in the remaining milk.  Bring to a boil, stirring, then reduce the heat, cover and simmer for 25 minutes.  Stir in the cream, cover and simmer for an additional 15 minutes.  Garnish with the cilantro leaves and serve with the rice.

Friday is Baked Chicken Breasts with Curry-Lime Butter.  Again this is a yummy main dish.  It has been a while since I've made this, but it makes a lot.  

Baked Chicken Breasts with Curry-Lime Butter

8 T. butter, softened
2 t. minced ginger root
2 t. freshly grated lime peel
1½ t. lime juice
1 T. curry powder
½ t. salt
12 boneless chicken breast halves
2 eggs
1½ c. fine dry bread crumbs

Mix 6 T. butter, the ginger, lime peel, lime juice, curry powder and ¼ t. salt; chill until firm.  Cut a 3" slit in the underside of each chicken breast to form a pocket.  Fill each breast with 1½ t. of the butter mixture; smooth the flesh over the butter.  Whisk the eggs and ¼ t. salt in a shallow dish.  Dip each breast half in the egg, then in the crumbs to coat well.  Arrange 1" apart on 2 greased jelly roll pans.  Dot with the remaining 2 T. butter; cover with foil.  Bake in a preheated 425° oven for 10 minutes. Uncover; turn each piece and bake 10 minutes longer or until the crumbs are golden brown and the chicken is tender when pierced. TO FREEZE:  COOL COMPLETELY, WRAP INDIVIDUALLY IN FOIL.  TO REHEAT:  PLACE FROZEN WRAPPED PORTIONS ON A BAKING SHEET IN A PREHEATED 400° OVEN 15 MINUTES, OPEN FOIL AND BAKE 10 MINUTES LONGER OR UNTIL HOT. Serves 12.

I can't believe break is over!

It seems like break was just yesterday...oh, wait, it was.

I tried very hard to make our last dinner of break as headache free as possible.  A 5 lb pork roast went in to give me 3 hours of freedom to leisurely set up and cook dinner.  I even set up things I needed for the week of prepping hubby's lunch so that wasn't a scramble in the morning.  It worked for the most part. The only problem I had happened this morning.  A dish fell out of the cabinet at me while putting dishes away from the dishwasher and broke (Mind you, we never break anything here.  It is really rare.) on the counter on it's way to the floor.  The upside is it was a new thrift store purchase at Thanksgiving, so the cost was negligible and the investment in our lives was short.  The downside was I needed to quickly sweep up the floor so my little furfaces (cats) would not have bloody paws when I came home from work.  All this before 7:15 AM. 

Chicken broth happened last night and became chicken soup tonight for our dinner.  I paired the soup with Tuna Sandwiches and since the broth was made last night, I just had to prep the veggies and chicken and toss it with the simmering broth.  It was ready in 20 minutes.  Again this was essentially free, save for the 1/2 of a chicken breast half I sliced up to put in the soup.  I took 12 carrot sticks that I had prepped last night and diced them, diced a small onion and a celery stalk, and then stir fried for a couple of minutes with the chicken until it was no longer pink.  I added this to the simmering broth with some garlic salt and orzo (melon seed shape) pasta and simmered until the noodles were done.  Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

Chicken Orzo Soup
1 lb chicken bones (I froze my bones from 2 dinners of drum sticks)
8 cups water
vegetable scraps ( Carrot peelings, onion peelings, celery cuttings)
1 small carrot, diced
1 small onion, diced
1 stalk celery, diced
1/2 chicken breast, about 4-6 oz., cut in 1/2 inch cubes
1 t. garlic salt
1/2 c. orzo pasta
Place the chicken bones, water and vegetable scraps in a 3 qt saucepan.  Simmer on low for about 2 hours.  Drain the broth through cheesecloth in a strainer.  In a 10" frying pan, add the veggies and chicken breast and saute until the chicken is no longer pink.  Add this to the reserved broth with the garlic salt and the orzo pasta.  Simmer 15-20 minutes or until the pasta is done.

Today was a long day.  First day back after Winter Break and I have finally become part of the digital age...I got my first smart phone today. It's been an adventure to say the least!  

Wednesday is Chicken Korma and Friday is Curried Lime Chicken Breast.  I'll post those recipes tomorrow.

Beef Barley Soup and Beyond

Beef Barley Soup...and beyond

So I made Beef Barley Soup for dinner last night.  I almost forgot to take a picture of it. (I was so silly, I ate my whole bowl of soup before I remembered!  Fortunately, I could still pour another bowl...I was hungry enough for seconds.)  We had the soup with our favorite potato rolls from Aldi...so yummy.

I usually make the recipe on the back of the Goya brand barley that we use.  It is perfect.  This time, though I made broth from the bones from our standing rib roast from Sunday and the meat for the soup came from the bones I used.  Essentially making this a free meal when it comes down to it.  I had saved my vegetable trimmings from Thanksgiving and New Years and frozen them.  I used half for the beef stock and I'll use the other half for the Chicken stock I'll make on Monday.  When I make my soup stock I just quarter an extra onion and peel the carrot I'll use for the soup itself and throw the peelings in too. (My Mormor would be so proud of me 💖)

I looked on the Goya website and couldn't locate the recipe that has been there forever.  So here is a variation of the Goya Recipe:

Beef & Vegetable Barley Soup
1 T. olive oil
1 lb boneless chuck, cubed
1 small onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
2 t. dried oregano
4 t. beef bouillon granules
4 c. water
1 bay leaf
15 oz can veggies, undrained or 1/2 bag frozen mixed veggies + 1 c. tomato        juice or tomato sauce
1/2 c. barley
Heat the oil in a large saucepan and brown the beef.  Stir in the onion and garlic.  Cook until the onions are tender.  Stir in the seasonings and water.  Bring to a boil; reduce the heat and simmer one hour.  Add the veggies and barley.  Cook over medium heat 30 minutes.  Serves 4.

Dinner Monday is Chicken Soup...I'll post the recipe tonight!

Pytt i Panna and this weeks meals...so far

The kids loved the Curried Beef in Pastry.  It made 18 pieces using all the crust recipe but I did have some filling leftover.  I put some on crackers and it was really good.  

Needless to say there were no leftovers for me to freeze...That means on Tuesday the 17th, the day the Indoor Track Season opens, I'm free to go out or make something else for dinner!  I think I'll make something else...I'll keep you posted.

That night we had Dusted Pork Chops for dinner.  That was delicious!  I sprinkled some garlic salt on the chops before broiling them.  As I said before I just combine the dry herbs and spices from South American Chicken and Quinoa in a spice shaker and then shake the dust on the chops (or chicken) until they are well coated.  I then broil them for 6 minutes on a side. Yum.

Which brings me to today.  I made Pytt i Panna for our meal today.  I had a recipe that I've misplaced, but this one I found is very close to why my recipe was like.  It comes from Swedishfood.com.  I made a vegetarian version for my kids who need to keep kosher or halal or who are indeed vegetarian.  I also made a version loaded with smoked sausage.  That was devoured. I am left with a generous serving I can freeze for the 19th. When I serve that I will make some eggs and sourdough English muffins for me to go with.  DH will do well with some biscuits and maybe some gravy as well.

Here is the recipe:

Pytt i Panna
2 lbs. cooked potatoes, peeled
5 oz. bacon
5 oz. leftover meat or ham
5 oz. smoked sausage
2 onions, minced
1 T. oil
1 T. butter
1 t. fresh thyme, chopped (1/2 t. dried)
1 T fresh herbs, such as parsley, to garnish

Roughly dice the peeled potatoes bacon, meat, and sausage into 1/2" cubes.  Finely chop the onion.  Heat a large nonstick frying pan or wok on medium heat.  Add the oil and butter and when foaming, add the potatoes and onions and fry until golden brown, stirring occasionally.  Meanwhile, heat a separate pan and when hot, add the diced bacon.  When the fat starts to render, add the meat, smoked sausage and thyme.  Fry  until everything is golden brown, giving it an occasional stir and adjusting the heat if it looks like it may burn.  When the meat is cooked, add to the potatoes and mix thoroughly.  Taste and add seasoning.  It will probably need a good pinch of pepper, but may not require any salt as the bacon is fairly salty.  Keep warm while you fry the eggs.  To serve, garnish with fresh herbs and top with fried eggs.  Serves 4.

Going to Museum of Science tomorrow...long, fun day!