Entries Tagged as 'dinner'

Chicken Marsala + a Birthday Giveaway!

38

02.5.13

Today, reader, I’m 26.

Hitting the second half of my twenties, unlike all of the previous birthdays, has me thinking about the next five years more than anything. The big 3-0 used to be something that you’d see twenty-somethings dreading. But not this girl.

When I was younger, I noticed a recurring theme on sitcoms and in dreaded sentiments from older people on birthdays — people complaining about age. And once, on my dad’s birthday, I asked him if he hated getting older, too.

His response was different. He told me that age was an accomplishment. And we should be proud of every year we live.

It was a great shift from the general “I hate birthdays” and “oh no, wrinkles” grumbles. Or the classic response from teachers and relatives when I’d talk about the excitement of getting older and growing up: “Oh, honey, you’ll get over that. That will change.”

Nope, I still get excited about birthdays. And you know what? The years only get better and better. Each and every year, each and every candle makes me happy about the life I live, the people I love, and amazing world I wake up to every morning.

Today, I’m celebrating my birthday by setting up a giveaway for you! I’ve been pretty obsessed with Knork flatware for the past two years — my former roommate and amazing friend Kristen introduced me to the brand when she first moved into her own apartment. And since then, I knew that I would want a set for myself when I moved into my own place.

The Knork concept that I love is that just one utensil blends the function of a knife and a fork into one beautiful design. My own mother taught me to cut food with the edge of a fork, so I’ve been doing this for years, but Knork takes it to the next level — the edges of the forks are beveled, making it easier to cut your food. They have finishes in both glossy and matte brushed silver (if they ever get a line of gold flatware, I’ll be first in line).

I’ve already had people over for dinner parties and explained the brilliance of the flatware to my friends. The general reaction is “but isn’t that dangerous? Will I cut myself on the edge of the fork?”

Come on, friends. They’re not that sharp — if you’re dining on a hearty steak, then you’ll probably need a knife, too. But the Knorks were exactly what I needed to enjoy this plate of chicken marsala.

So, like the communications professional I am, I stalked them online and got in contact with their communications team — and Knork will be sponsoring a 20-piece flatware set for the winner of this contest!

To enter, check out Knork’s pretty flatware selections on Knork.net, and leave a comment below — be sure to let me know which finish (matte or shiny) of the flatware you’d be interested in!

One week from today, I’ll use a random generator to select a winner — and we’ll get in contact so I can forward your information to the folks at Knork, who will promptly send your flatware set!

I honestly can’t think of a better way to celebrate my birthday with you via Sweetsonian. Good luck!

Chicken Marsala for two

2 cups chicken broth
1 shallot, minced
5 tablespoons butter, unsalted
1 package cremini mushrooms, sliced
A few sprigs of fresh sage, leaves julienned
All-purpose flour, for dredging
4 thin-sliced chicken breast halves (or two breasts pounded thin with a hammer)
3/4 cup dry Marsala wine
1/3 cup heavy cream
Juice from 1 lemon

In a small saucepan, bring your chicken broth to a boil. Let it reduce to about half it’s original volume.

Heat a cast iron skillet over medium heat, and melt about 3 tablespoons of the butter. Then, saute the minced shallot until brown — this should take just a minute or two. Add mushrooms, and sprinkle with sage, salt, and pepper for seasoning. Cook over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally, letting the mushrooms sweat a bit to give some liquid to the pan. It should take about 10 minutes for the mushrooms to brown. Once they do, transfer the contents of the skillet to a bowl and set aside.

Pat the chicken breasts dry, season with salt and pepper, and then dredge in flour. You don’t need a lot of flour — just a light coating is sufficient. Heat a tablespoon of butter in the skillet, and saute the chicken. Do not crowd the pan, or else the chicken will not brown. Flip the chicken once, when it turns golden and is clear that it’s cooked halfway through. Repeat with each side and each slice of chicken.

Once cooked, remove each slice of chicken and set aside.

Then, add about 1/2 cup of the Marsala wine to the skillet and bring to a boil, using a wooden spoon to scrape up the brown bits from the bottom of the skillet. Then, add your broth, mushrooms, shallots, and heavy cream. Stir occasionally and let the broth thicken a little — it should only take a few minutes. Then, stir in the remainder of the wine, and a few squeezes of juice from a lemon.

Plate your chicken, and generously top with your mushrooms and marsala sauce. Garnish with remaining sage.

Pasta Primavera

4

31.10.12

November makes me think of my youngest brother.

Kevin was born in November, when I was seventeen. At the time, he was three months premature — and in North Carolina.

So my dad and I spent a lot of time flying back and forth between L.A. and Chapel Hill to spend time with Kevin and Susie (my stepmom).

Kevin makes me think of high school. I recently found my Livejournal. That was embarrassing. And… I used to think I was really good at Photoshop. I guess we all need a reality check once in a while.

Bad photoshop and high school remind me of when I first toyed with the idea of being a graphic designer. I went to an art school open house when I was a junior, only to realize that I went a week late. I took it as a sign that I wasn’t entirely cut out to be a designer. Like my bad Photoshop skills, this also makes me smile.

I’m getting to a point in my life where the people around me, whether they’re close in age or they’re not, are starting to figure out what to do with their lives. It’s refreshing and exhilarating. Words cannot express how excited I am to see someone who was once frustrated start a new phase in life — doing what they love, loving what they do, and amazing the world with his or her spectacular talents.

Kevin, at age seven, is a pumpkin carving pro.

My dad likes to take Kevin to the pumpkin patch on Halloween, when pumpkins are in clearance mode. They purchase basically whatever is left at the pumpkin patch with however much cash is in my dad’s wallet. Last year, it was something like 14 pumpkins for one dollar each.

Kevin, unlike myself, can carve pumpkins for four hours straight.

For the first time in years, I’ll be sitting inside this Halloween. I’ll be hoping Sasha and Malia trick-or-treat at my house (my fingers are still crossed), while eating Ethiopian food and drinking this cocktail.

I’ve long since bid my farewell to summer. After all, my flip flops never really get too dusty, as I break them out every December for my annual trip to L.A. But this primavera — it’s too hard to let go of. I made this back when the vegetables were fresher and less expensive, but winter never stops me from doing anything now, does it?

Happy Halloween. It’s a good holiday, and I hope you enjoy it.

Pasta Primavera

Ingredients:
Note: measurements are estimates. Use your best judgement.
2 carrots, either julienned or finely chopped
Half an onion, finely diced
Handful of cherry tomatoes, halved
Handful of fresh broccoli florets
Drizzle of olive oil
Handful of fresh basil, sliced into strips
1/4 cup heavy cream
1 clove garlic, minced
As much pasta as you desire. For two, I usually cook a half pound.

Instructions:

Fill a large pot halfway with water, and bring to a boil. Add a pinch or two of salt, and throw some pasta in. I used linguini, which takes just over 10 minutes to get to al dente. Have a strainer ready over your sink. Pour the contents of your pot into the strainer, under cold running water. The cold water stops the pasta from cooking — and you definitely do not want overcooked linguini. Once cooled, drizzle with some olive oil, and delve your hands into the pasta to toss it. You don’t want your pasta sticking to itself and drying out.

In a large chef’s pan over medium-high heat, saute your finely diced onions, your carrots, and your tomatoes. Once the onions begin to soften, add the broccoli, garlic and basic, and a little more olive oil. The tomatoes will start to cook, and their insides will provide a nice base for the sauce.

When the broccoli is cooked to your taste (I like mine still crisp, with parts of the edges browned), stir in the heavy cream. The sauce should take on a light tomato-cream consistency.

Toss the pasta with your primavera sauce, and serve with fresh parmesan cheese.

Banh Mi, and a Happy Picnic

4

27.8.11

It seems like the only time I really get to blog these days is when I find time on vacation. How sad is that? I really wish it wasn’t so difficult to find time to do everything I love.

But then again, I do love a lot of things. (more…)

Chicken Adobo

2

08.9.10

The pictures really say it all — Filipino comfort food, which iFlipforFood, a fellow food blogger in Washington (but soon to be Los Angeles) got me going on. Can’t write now, must rush off. Will be back with baked surprises soon.

WHAT YOU NEED:

2 to 3 chicken breasts (my mom always used a whole chicken, skin and all… this is my healthier remix)
1 onion
3 to 4 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons of a neutral oil (I use vegetable oil)
a few bay leaves
3/4 cup soy sauce
1/3 cup of a white vinegar (I used rice vinegar)
fresh black pepper
steamed rice (to serve with)

WHAT TO DO:

First, heat the oil with the garlic and onions in a medium-sized saucepan. Once hot, place the chicken in the pan — let each side cook for 1 to 2 minutes on high, allowing the surface to brown. Then, remove the chicken and set aside.

Combine the soy sauce, vinegar, bay leaves, and pepper in the saucepan over low heat. Once the sauces start to simmer (and consequently deglaze the marks left by your searing chicken), place the chicken back into the pan, and cover. Let it simmer for ten to fifteen minutes — and about half way through, stir the chicken around. You want it to soak up all the tastes from this surprisingly amazing combination of flavors.

Creamy Spinach Vodka Sauce and Sautéed Chicken

7

12.7.10

I spent the past few days at the beach — happily so, since Washington has proven unable to supply weather suitable to foster my addiction to running (see previous beach running entry here). It was beautiful, active, and as expected, it brought back my memories of growing up in sunny Southern California. It’s funny, really — I truly believe I’m a rare breed of the East coast girl who accidentally grew up surrounded by the beach bum culture that California breeds. I wouldn’t have my upbringing any other way — I lived on the beach for a couple of wonderful years. Sometimes I catch myself feeling out of place, particularly in the deep south or more commonly in Virginia, but I remember the weather and the politics and the history and the creativity that oozes out of every street corner on this coast, and then I feel at home. And I remember that I found myself, and my ability to channel my own creativity through writing and food, upon moving to this coast.

The beach, naturally, reminds me of living in Santa Barbara. For a year, my dorm friends and I ate dorm food and wore bikinis to class and ran to the goleta pier on a daily basis. We had family dinners at a round table surrounded by glass windows as the sun set across campus, and we smuggled nalgene bottles filled with cranberry juice and backpacks stuffed to the brim with fruit for snacks the following day. And then we finished our first year, and some moved into houses and apartments on the oceanside cliffs of Isla Vista, and our family dinners continued, oftentimes evolving into family brunches — the key factors included good food, music, and company. And then I left that beachside paradise for a university that was closer to home and better for my interests and degree, but I found myself returning to those same friends, for family dinners and brunches (in different houses), where my transition to adult life began. Point being, I am writing this under a beach umbrella from my iPhone; the setting, as unsatisfying as it is compared to my Isla Vista beach, makes me remember how wonderful UCSB appealed to my senses. Even a small, smelly, overpopulated beach can make me feel slightly closer to what I called home for decades.

I don’t mean to offend any East Coasters, but the beaches just don’t compare. It’s like comparing plain, canned tomatoes to a homemade mushroom and spinach vodka reduction, poured over freshly browned organic chicken breast slices. I may be an East coast girl these days, but I will always be a Gaucho at heart. Well, I’m a Bruin for athletics and academics, but for natural aesthetics and appreciation for small communities, I revert to my Gaucho past. But I guess what this weekend came down to is the fact that I’m just a beach snob.

WHAT YOU NEED:

2 chicken breasts, sliced into tenders

olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

2 to 3 cloves garlic, minced

1 medium sized onion

2 to 3 cups fresh spinach (or mushrooms, both work wonders)

1 cup tomatoes (I used small heirlooms from my garden)

3/4 cup vodka

1/2 cup heavy cream

WHAT TO DO:

First, slice the chicken breasts into tenders, about 1/2 to 3/4 inches thick. Pat them dry with paper towels (wet chicken tends not to brown). Heat a skillet over a low flame and sautee the garlic and onions. Add the chicken tenders, and let them cook until browned on both sides. If you are having trouble browning the chicken, brush a little bit of all-purpose flour on each slice, which will encourage better browning. After the chicken is finished, remove from the skillet and cover.

With the garlic and onions still in the skillet, dice or slice the tomatoes according to your preference and add them to the other ingredients. If you are using mushrooms, add them now. If you use spinach, let the tomatoes cook down for about 10 minutes. Then, add the vodka and let simmer for another minute or so. Then, add the spinach, stirring until it collapses. Drizzle olive oil if necessary. When the sauce forms a nice texture, remove from heat and stir in the heavy cream. Serve over chicken, and sprinkle with parmesan cheese.

Pizza Bianca

6

04.7.10

Everyone grew up with pizza, right? Sleepovers, elementary school pizza parties, Book-its (remember those?)… pizza took up some sort of memory in American households in the 80s and 90s. After all, our parents were workaholics, and not everyone could have been blessed with home-cooked meals every single living day of their lives. It was always that special treat we got as kids, like soda and ice cream, if and when dinner turned to disaster or the amount of effort required to feed a pool party exceeded the time and patience available in the kitchen. Birthday parties and movie nights were filled with pizzas in my childhood.

After spending last weekend in New York, and the week prior in Louisiana and Mississippi, I was on a veggie detox. Never have I eaten such vast amounts of unhealthy food and drink. I’ve done my fair share of attempting to visit New York without having a slice of pizza, but it just doesn’t work. Ever. I don’t know what it is, but that city’s reputation for pizza aligned with my absolute love for all foods orgasmic Italian will probably contribute to the end of me, in 80 years, insha’allah. We stumbled across Rocky’s pizzeria in Manhattan, and I had “Grandma’s pizza,” loaded with fresh, minced roasted garlic and some sort of pureed bruschetta-like sauce. My inquiry regarding the types of tomatoes or any other ingredients was respectfully denied, and replaced with a plate of chocolate mousse. To diefor. I’ll dream about that pizza until I figure out how to clone its recipe. And then I won’t tell anyone, simply requiring your presence to witness how amazing it really is. I don’t know exactly when or how I fell in love with food and hosting dinners, but as you can see via this blog, this lustful romance has taken over my life.

A number of friends are in Washington this weekend, en route from cities all over the world. Naturally, my town house looks like a tornado swept through, dropping off traveling goods from India, Bolivia, and other American cities that my friends have been through — I really am lucky to have friends all over the world. I am, after all, visiting one in Bogota this summer.

Will I take my pizza recipes to South America? It honestly depends on how much time I spend salsa dancing. I’d rather be salsa dancing than anything else — that’s one of the downsides of living in Washington. The salsa dancing scene sucks. I guess I do miss one thing from Los Angeles — Third Street Promenade street salsa Sunday evenings. If Washington had something similar, my life would feel slightly more complete.

Anyway, I made two different types of white pizza for my visitors, who have, consequently, been eating non-stop for the past 48 hours: broccoli-feta-mozzarella, and a zucchini/goat cheese and lemon pizza. They make a really easy and impressive quick fix for having more than enough guests to enjoy a balcony brunch on a breezy, beautiful Saturday morning.

WHAT YOU NEED:

for the zucchini pizza:

Pizza dough. For the sake of time, I used Trader Joe’s ready-made, one dollar pizza dough.
1 fresh zucchini
Lots of goat cheese
1 lemon, or 2-3 tablespoons lemon juice
Fresh, cracked pepper
Olive oil, for working with the pizza dough

for the broccoli pizza:

(More) pizza dough
2 to 3 cups fresh broccoli, tossed in olive oil, salt, and pepper
1 cup feta cheese
1 cup mozzarella cheese
Olive oil

WHAT TO DO:

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Making pizza is pretty self-explanatory, and I’m positive that you understand the idea. I like to keep my pizza crusts thin and even: no one likes biting into a doughy crust that could have used another five minutes in the oven. So play it safe, and spread the crust to be extra thin (but don’t puncture it).

I don’t use sauces on my white pizzas, although, alfredo or some other white cheese sauce would be to die for. Or even pesto — yes, I often use pesto on my pizzas instead of tomato sauce. For the zucchini pizza, I used my fingers to spread a soft goat cheese evenly on the crust, and then used a vegetable peeler to slice the zucchini. I like having the zucchini extra thin on pizzas because it bakes to a crisp and just looks beautiful. After dressing the pizza with the zucchini, use a pepper mill to grind fresh pepper to your liking, and squeeze some fresh lemon juice all over the pizza, to get a nice tangy flavor in each slice of zucchini.

The broccoli pizza is easy — simply toss the broccoli, feta, and mozzarella together in a bowl, and evenly spread the toppings over your crust. Sometimes I like to add a little basil or marjoram to the mix. For both pizzas, bake for 12 to 17 minutes. To roast the vegetables, I turned the heat of the oven up to about 400 degrees for the last few minutes.

Waffle Iron Panini

4

07.6.10

I remember the Tanzanian breakfasts most vividly; I had never been a fan of breakfast until waking up to the beautiful setup became a part of everyday life. The fresh passionfruit juice, homemade chai tea, chapatis… just thinking about it makes me want to book a trip to Dar. Not that tracking down the people I met there would be easy at all, but I’ve kept in touch with one of the volunteers, and I’m sure a return trip is somewhere in my future. I’d love to see my students all grown-up, and I would kill to swim in that beautiful ocean once again.

One of the things I brought back with me originated from the days that we would return from school early, absolutely famished. We bought loaves of bread and fresh tomatoes from street vendors in our broken Swahili. With intermittent electricity during the dry season, toast quickly became a distant memory that I had gravely taken advantage of in the states — and a toaster was unheard of, so we resorted to our makeshift waffle iron. It actually worked pretty well — the waffle imprints made great pockets for fresh peanut butter, passion fruit jam, or any other sandwich go-betweens. To this day, I make replicas of the tomato-mayo sandwiches I was obsessed with years ago. Salty tomato sandwiches are still one of my favorite things in the world.

Needless to say, when I spotted a waffle iron panini entry on foodgawker, I had to copy it — anyway, I had a history with waffle iron toast. Why not step it up a notch?

Turkey, hummus, plum tomatoes, swiss cheese, and French bread.

I think you can handle making a sandwich from here

Taco Night

10

18.4.10

It’s sad to say this, but until today, I haven’t eaten tacos since I left Los Angeles.

I know. It’s tragic. But I ended my Mexican food drought today, at the request of my Norwegian friend and neighbor. Naturally, being skeptical of Mexican food on the East coast, I called my cooking mentor in Los Angeles for advice. When I was nineteen, I fundraised for a volunteer trip to Tanzania — a friend of my father offered to help support my cause in exchange for help in the kitchen. I basically spent my Saturday afternoons that summer chopping vegetables in his kitchen, but learned to cook in the process (I can attribute my cooking skills to him these days). He is the authority on authentic Mexican food — I spent Christmas breaks making tamales (and almond florentines) en masse. So this morning he gave me recipe instructions for legit tacos.

They were quite successful — luckily, they sell some sort of variation of “Mexican Chili Powder” at Secret Safeway in Dupont. And we made tacos for nine people. Needless to say, Dillon and I spent our entire Saturday slaving in the kitchen and are now in a state of taco coma, while my friends are having trouble convincing me to go out. I’ll probably head to my favorite bar in an hour anyway.

WHAT YOU NEED:

Bone-in chicken breasts (we made about six pounds)
Salt and pepper to taste
Mexican chili powder
Vegetable Oil — about 1.5 cups for 5 pounds chicken
Onions, diced
Garlic, minced
Corn tortillas
Shredded cheese

Toppings:

More shredded cheese
Lettuce, finely chopped
Tomatos, diced
Sliced avocados
Lime, sliced

WHAT TO DO:

Boil the chicken in water with a pinch or two of salt for about two hours, until chicken is fully cooked and tender. Let cool, and then shred finely by hand, then toss in chili powder, salt, and pepper to taste. Preheat your oven to broil.

In a large frying pan or wok, sautee the garlic diced onions until translucent. Then add the shredded chicken to the pan, mixing vegetable oil according to appropriate texture (you don’t want the chicken to be too dry or too oily). Use salt and pepper to taste, and toss in dried oregano. Afterwards, transfer the chicken into an oven-safe pan, like a casserole dish, and drizzle shredded cheese on top. Broil in the oven for ten minutes, until the cheese is bubbling.

In the meantime, prepare the tomatoes, lettuce, limes, and avocados for toppings. Heat corn tortillas over the open flame on your stove, two at a time, as if they were one tortilla. Flip them with caution until the bread puffs slightly, and wrap them in a warm towel until all are complete. Remove chicken from the oven, and serve.

Sloppy Dads, Sloppy Joes

1

09.4.10

Some of my favorite memories of childhood stem from visiting my dad after my parents split up. My parents went through a nasty divorce when I was a kid, but our dad was always the perfect cure of goofiness and a hands-off upbringing that I can attribute much of my personality to today. It also explains why all of my college guy friends befriended my dad after losing a number of drinking games to him at a UCLA-USC tailgate! Anyway, when I was eleven or so, my dad moved into his own house in Reseda, a Hispanic suburb of Los Angeles. He would pick my younger brother and me up on Wednesday nights for visitation, and we’d make dinner, do homework, and go to the driving range, or go running, or some other odd activity that defined nights with Dad.

One of the most-told memories at the Gerrity family gatherings dealt with visitation nights at Dad’s — forget that I taught him how to do laundry or the fact that he lived off of beer and canned sardines for a while — the night he made sloppy joes for dinner was just so typically Dad. He picked us up from Mom’s, and we headed to Ralph’s to go grocery shopping. After years of hearing about his childhood favorite, “sloppy joes,” our father was finally determined to make them. So he bought the canned mix and burger buns, amongst other odds and ends that he ate during the week (packaged sandwich meat, string cheese, and his personal favorite: Trader Joe’s taquitos). We got home; he poured the can into a saucepan on the stove, and toasted the buns. When I came into the kitchen to have him check my homework assignments, I asked the magic question.

“Dad, aren’t you supposed to cook it with meat?”

When he tells the story these days, he justifies that he assumed a can of sloppy joe would automatically come with meat in it (as repulsing as that sounds now). To be honest, I don’t actually remember how we resolved it that night: we probably migrated down the street to our favorite Mexican joint, Melody’s. The important details illustrated the smartest, most rational figure in our childhood, forgetting something so basic simply because he was not used to organizing normal weeknight dinners for his kids on his own. Looking back on it, I realize how adorable it really was. But since then, Daddy has learned to triumph in the kitchen, and he had done so long before I even tried cooking. To celebrate, he installed an amazing poolside kitchen a few years ago, complete with his own kegerator. He’s come a long way from sloppy joes.

WHAT YOU NEED:

1 French baguette
3 medium sized chicken breasts, diced
1 onion, finely diced
1 red bell pepper, also diced
2 large cloves garlic
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 teaspoons worcestershire sauce
2 teaspoons white wine vinegar
1 small can tomato paste
1 12-14 oz. canned tomatoes, finely chopped (use a food processor if needed!)
2 teaspoons ground cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon rosemary
salt and pepper to taste

WHAT TO DO:

First, sauté the garlic, onions, olive oil, and chicken together until the onions are translucent. Then, add the bell pepper and cook on low heat for 3 to 4 more minutes. Combine the worcestershire sauce, vinegar, and tomato ingredients in the saucepan as well. Heat on low until bubbling. Then, add dry ingredients slowly, stirring continuously and tasting as you go.

Slice the baguette horizontally lengthwise, and toast in the oven. As a variation, brush a little butter or olive oil to help toast — then, spoon the sloppy joe mix onto the baguettes. I prefer mine open faced, and therefore slightly more refined. Don’t be ashamed if it gets everywhere… we cleaned up and enjoyed our isolated thunderstorm evening with a nice Sauvignon Blanc, strawberries, and mint hookah.

Entries Tagged as 'dinner'

Chicken Marsala + a Birthday Giveaway!

38

02.5.13

Pasta Primavera

4

31.10.12

Banh Mi, and a Happy Picnic

4

27.8.11

Chicken Adobo

2

08.9.10

Creamy Spinach Vodka Sauce and Sautéed Chicken

7

12.7.10

Pizza Bianca

6

04.7.10

Waffle Iron Panini

4

07.6.10

Taco Night

10

18.4.10

Sloppy Dads, Sloppy Joes

1

09.4.10

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