Sweet and Sour Chicken

I'm not entirely sure where my mom found this recipe, but she makes a pretty great sweet and sour chicken. It's a bit time consuming to make since you have to batter and fry the chicken, but I think it's worth it for the final product.

Ingredients:

1 1/2 pounds of boneless chicken breast

1 large green pepper cubed

1 large red pepper cubed

1 large yellow onion cut in large pieces

1 can sliced water chestnuts

1 1/2 cups bean sprouts

1 pineapple, chopped into 1 1/2 inch pieces

1/2 cup vegetable oil

Batter:

1 cup flour

1/2 cup water

2 eggs

1/2 tsp seasoning salt

Sauce:

4 tsp cornstarch dissolved into 1 cup orange juice

1/2 cup water

3/4 cup of sugar

8 tsp

1/2 cup ketchup
8 tsp soy sauce
3 tsp vegetable oil

Mix together sauce ingredients and reserve. Heat oil in a deep wok. Cut chicken into 1 inc pieces. Mix batter and dip chicken into batter. Once oil has heated to 350, fry chicken and flip after 2-4 minutes on each side until evenly browned and remove from oil. Add peppers, onion, chestnuts, and pineapple to oil and stir-fry for 4 minutes. Add sauce to veggies and cook for another 2 minutes. Return chicken to wok and toss with vegetables until chicken is evenly coated with sauce. Serve over steamed rice.

Pumpkin Bisque

Annually, my mom kicks off our Thanksgiving meal with fragrant, rich pumpkin bisque soup. It's relatively easy to make, and my relatives are always rather impressed by this starter. In case you keep kosher (my parents do), this soup uses coconut milk rather than cream and is dairy free, so it can be paired with our meat-based Thanksgiving din.

Ingredients:
3 1/2 cups chicken broth
2 1/2 cups water
14 oz. can light unsweetened coconut milk
29 oz. can solid packed pumpkin
1 large Spanish onion, diced
1 large apple, peeled, cored and diced
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 tbsp maple syrup or honey
1 tbsp fresh ginger, grated
2 tbsp coriander
1/2 tsp ground cumin
pinch of nutmeg to garnish
salt and pepper to taste

Mix all ingredients in a large pot, except the coconut milk. Simmer covered for 30 minutes. Puree soup with an immersion blender, food processor, blender or whatever method you prefer. Add coconut soup and continue to simmer for 10 minutes. Sprinkle each serving with a dusting of nutmeg.

Crazy Noodles at Mint Cafe in Cleveland

Every Thanksgiving I head to my hometown, Cleveland, to visit my family. People talk a lot of shit about the "mistake on the lake," but I must say, I'm quite fond of it. There's all kinds of delicious foods to be had (way more than my current digs, Columbia, MO).

Today I caught up with a friend at Mint Cafe in Coventry, a really cute area of Cleveland Heights. I got really amazing, greasy, delicious crazy noodles, which is pretty much a different name for standard drunken noodles. I was particularly thrilled because noteworthy Thai food is hard to come by in Columbia, thus my standards have been lowered significantly since leaving NYC in August.

Crazy noodles met my NYC Thai food standards and were fucking delicious, if i do say so myself. The soft wide rice noodles were stir-fried with chicken, shrimp, egg, onion, carrots, broccoli a chili laden soy sauce and basil leaves. They went a little heavy on the onions, but that was cool with me. All in all, my lunch was a delight.

Roasted Carrots Tossed in Dill

When I was in Columbia last week, I was invited to an early Thanksgiving dinner (which was unfortunately canceled...bummer). Anywho, I'd already peeled 4 pounds of carrots when I found out dinner was off, so you'd better believe I proceeded to roast the hell out of my carrots and toss them with dill once they were nice and caramelized.

Roasted Carrots Tossed in Dill

4 lbs carrots, peeled

3 tablespoons olive oil

1 1/4 teaspoons kosher salt

1/2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper

2 tablespoons minced fresh dill

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

Cut carrots diagonally in 3/4-1 inch-thick slices. Toss them in a bowl with the olive oil, salt, and pepper. Transfer to a sheet pan in 1 layer and roast in the oven for 35-40 minutes, until brown and tender. Toss carrots with dill , season to taste, serve and enjoy.

Italian Style Cabbage Soup

Costing less than $1.50 per very filling serving, this rustic cabbage soup is perfect for weeks when you're hurting for money (thanks recession).

I've had a head of cabbage in my veggie drawer for the last 2 weeks and today, I decided to show it some love by making cabbage soup for lunch. Cooking cabbage with tomatoes is fabulous because it brings out a subtle sweet and sour flavor. Punch that tang up with ground pepper to taste (I used approx 1/4 tsp) and you've got a nice flavor profile that suggests you simmered this soup for at least an hour, despite the fact that from start to finish it took a mere half hour.

Ingredients (serves one very hungry girl):

2 cups veggie broth

1/2 of a 14 oz. can of whole peeled tomatoes (you can used diced if you want, but I like the rough shapes you get from just smashing the tomatoes in your hand)

2 tbsp olive oil

1/4 head of white cabbage, cored and roughly chopped

1 clove of crushed garlic

1/4 small white onion roughly diced

5 leaves of basil cut in a chiffonade

1/4 tsp thyme

1/4 tsp oregano

salt and pepper to taste

Saute onions in olive oil until translucent, add garlic, pepper and cabbage. Stir fry contents of pan for 2-3 minutes. Add broth, tomatoes (smashed into smaller pieces if you're going that route) and liquid from can. Add thyme and oregano and stir. Simmer for 15-20 minutes and add basil. Salt and pepper to taste.

Chicken Enchiladas

These took a while to make (had to simmer the filing for about an hour to get it nice and tender), but they were well worth the wait.

Kyler slathered his in cheese....

I didn't because I'm not a huge queso fan (pardon the shadow here)...

Chicken filling:
2 chicken breasts
1 tbsp vegetable oil
1/2 red pepper sliced into strips
1/2 green pepper sliced into strips
1 small yellow onion diced
1 clove crushed garlic
1 1/2 cups chicken broth
1 diced medium sized tomato
1 tsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp cayenne
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp garlic powder
salt and pepper to taste

Heat oil in medium saucepan and add onions and garlic. Cook until brown and then add peppers, tomato, seasonings, chicken and broth. Stir and simmer at a medium low heat. After about 45 minutes, remove chicken breasts, shred and return to pan. Cook for another 15-20 minutes.

Enchiladas (not so homemade...ew, I'm like crazy Sandra Lee!):
1 package fresh tortillas
28 ounce can of enchilada sauce (we went with mild red by La Victoria)

Heat enchilada sauce in a shallow pan. Cover the bottom of a deep baking dish with sauce. Dip each tortilla individually in the warm sauce, roll chicken mixture in tortilla (keeping the meat all on one side before rolling is a good way to keep them from falling apart). Line rolled tortillas up side-by-side in pan. Top with remaining sauce and top with as much, little or no cheese at all. Bake at 450 for 30 minutes.

Sliced Steak Sammich time...

Before we headed out to tailgate for Mizzou homecoming (8 solid hours of drinking) it seemed a brilliant idea to load up on carbs in the form of steak sammiches...it was.

Putting these together was pretty simple.

You need:
1/2 pound of very finely sliced sirolin
1/2 green pepper
1/2 yellow onion
1/4 tsp garlic salt
pinch of pepper
hoagie buns
lettuce (a few leaves for each hoagie)
tomato (a few slices for each)
A1 steak sauce (to taste)

Fry up the beef, pepper and onion in shallow pan (I didn't add any oil). Sprinkle with garlic salt. Cook until all the meat is browned. Top bun with sirolin, veggie mixture, dress with tomato, lettuce and add A1 to taste. (Feel free to add cheese if you're into that).