Fried Chicken

I've been watching Ina Garten again.  This really works.  Fool-proof. Moist.  Delicious.

The only catch is you gotta think ahead--marinating the chicken the night before you cook it.  Or all morning for an evening meal. Oh.....And it makes a huge mess. 

Buy a chicken and cut it up.  Or buy the parts you like.  Marinate it overnight in about a cup or so of buttermilk.

For lunch the next day:

Mix the coating:  2 cups of flour with 1 Tablespoon salt, 1 Tablespoon pepper, and 2 teaspoons garlic powder.

Dredge the chicken in the coating. 

put about 2" oil in a cast iron skillet

Fry at 360 degrees for about 3 minutes each side, or until brown.

Place chicken on a cookie cooling rack placed over a baking pan..

Finish cooking in the oven at 350 degrees for about 30-40 minutes

Chocolate Ice Cream

This started out as an Ina Garten recipe for Chocolate Sorbet.  I wanted to turn it into an ice cream so I substituted milk and cream.  But Ina has taught me that adding coffee and/or cinnamon to chocolate brings out the chocolate flavor.  And this recipe proves her point,  This takes chocolate to the nth degree.

1 cup sugar
1/2 cup cocoa powder (like Hersey's)
1 teaspoon instant coffee
pinch of salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups half and half
1 cup whole milk
1 cup whipping cream
(I guess if you consider half and half to be half milk and half cream you could just use 4 cups of half and half.  duh.)

Heat this on the stove until the cocoa dissolves and everything is combined.
Cool in the refrigerator. Freeze in the ice cream mixer.

Chocolate Sauce

This is one of the mainstay recipes in our family.  We have always called it Papa Els' recipe, although it certainly came from either his mother or his sister.  My money says it's really Aunt Esther's Chocolate Sauce, because she also made a killer bourbon sauce that is very similar.  Whoever taught it to George-- it is a winner. Elizabeth had the recipe memorized by the time she was in high school; Sarah, by the time she was 11 years old.  None of the ingredients are perishable so I keep it all on hand.  And every time she comes to our house it's all right here ready for her. 

1 cup sugar
a 5 ounce can of Evaporated Milk
1/2 stick of butter
pinch of salt
2 squares of semi-sweet chocolate
vanilla

Put everything except the vanilla into a pan with a stout bottom so it cooks slowly and deliberately.  Stir as everything melts. The better you stir, the more homogeneous and creamy it will be.  A wire whisk or electric mixer does a great job.  As soon as it starts to bubble, give it an extra whirl with the mixer and take it off the heat.  I think this keeps it from being grainy or having sugar crystals form.

Now you add a healthy dose of vanilla, maybe a Tablespoon. Once Sarah's hand slipped and we thought she might had added too much but it didn't hurt anything. You know how we are about our vanilla. Stir it again and and pour into 1/2 pint jars.  It will fill two jars perfectly.  You can use it on top ice cream now if you want to call them hot fudge sundaes.  If you let the jars cool the lid makes a neat popping sound as it cools.  Sometimes Beaven gets into a hurry for it to cool and he puts the jar in a bowl of ice. It will thicken as it cools.

You should probably store it in the refrigerator but we've never had it last long enough to spoil.  

Chicken Gourmet

Alternate Title: Free-Range Chicken in Mushroom Sauce
(but using store-bought chickens because I would never kill the family pet)

This was the first recipe I learned to cook.  My Daddy saw it on one of the first cooking shows in Dallas.  The first, everyone raised in Dallas knows, was the Julie Benell show on Channel 8.  But in the early 60's the PBS station produced a local cooking show with a guy named David Wade.  Daddy was really into cooking at this time since we was between wives and decided that if he had to cook he might as well make the best of it.

Yes, dear ones, I am so old that fast food had not been invented when I was young.

This was also the dish I landed a husband with. I can't help but remember that once I cooked this for Beaven his interest in me deepened.  It's one of my kids favorites.  I've amended it a bit-- but only minor adjustments to keep up with the times.  In the early 1960's for instance you couldn't buy fresh mushrooms in the grocery store so the original recipe called for canned mushrooms.  It also used Cooking Sherry instead of the real thing.  So, in most respects this recipe is an improvement over the original.

I have no idea if the flavor would be different if you used freshly killed free-range chickens since I'll never be allowed to kill a chicken at this house as long as Beaven Els lives and breathes.

And I've cooked this so many times that it might be hard for me to write out instructions but I'll try.

Ingredients:
1 package skinless, boneless chicken breasts
(which I will grant you is a lot easier than catching a chicken, donning a rubber apron, slitting the chicken's throat and letting it bleed out, then boiling a few gallons of water, scalding the chicken, plucking the feathers, then gutting and skinning the bird.)

a couple of onions, sliced
a package of carrots (big or baby, peeled or not but definitely sliced into thin coins
a package of mushrooms, sliced

Chicken stock (you can buy this in the soup aisle or make your own using my recipe)
cream or whole milk--1/2 cup
Sherry (not cooking sherry, that stuff is nasty)

salt and pepper
a stick of butter

Tenderize the chicken breasts  by pounding with a mallet or rolling pin.  Gently saute them in some butter until they're brown.  Set the meat aside.  In the same pan add some more butter (maybe the other half of the stick) Saute the carrots until brown and carmelized.  Add the onions and cook until translucent.  Add the mushrooms last and brown them just a bit.  Add about two cups of chicken broth. Then add 1/2 cup of sherry.  Cook this until the flavors blend --maybe half an hour or so.  Add the cream or whole milk and lower the temperature to just keep it warm but not bubbling.  Thinly slice the chicken breasts across the grain and add the chicken and let it simmer gently for another half an hour.  Don't let it come to a boil.  Add another 1/2 cup of sherry and serve over egg noodles.

The sherry sweetens the dish and makes it richer.  You can add more sherry anytime you want if you don't think you have enough.  I don't think you can add too much.  The biggest mistake I make is when I try to raise the heat and/or get in a hurry.  High heat will mess this up.  Low and Slow is the key to this recipe.

Broccoli Salad

This was so popular at the Garland Womens Retreat that we asked the kitchen for the recipe.  I notice it comes from a popular cooking show hostess.  I hope she won't sue us for publishing the recipe.  We're not making any money from it, we're just making a great compliment to the cooks at Camp Gilmont and the Cooking Show Hostess whose name I won't mention because I don't want her people surfing the internet for recipe thieves and finding me then sueing me for a million dollars just for one little broccoli salad recipe.  Sheesh.

Now I'm almost afraid to ask who brought the spicy crackers she made and get her recipe for it.  Proceed at your own risk.

Fresh Cranberry Relish

This is from the Dallas Arboretum cookbook.  Whenever I think of cranberry relish I think of the canned stuff you invariably forget to put on the table until after the meal is over. It also doesn't taste all that great.  THIS recipe is delicious.

4 cups fresh cranberries (or one package)
2 apples, cored
2 oranges, seeded
Orange zest
3/4 cup sugar

Zest the oranges.  Chop the cranberries.  Peel and chop the apples.  Peel and chop the oranges. Mix it all together with the juices from all that peeling and chopping.  Add the sugar.

If you have any left over after the big meal you can use it to make a great fruit smoothie.

Cheese Wafers

I got a lot of compliments on these crackers at the annual Womens Retreat at Gilmont this weekend.  I can't take credit for them because I got the recipe from a cookbook the Dallas Arboretum put out.  It has recipes of some of the great dishes they serve in their tea room.

No matter where it came from this recipe produces a crisp, light and tasty savory for afternoon tea:

1/2 pound butter (Now you understand why this is so good.)
4 cups of grated Sharp Cheese
2 cups of flour
1 cup of finely chopped pecans
1 Tablespoon Paprika
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon salt

Blend the butter and cheese together.  Add the pecans and spices and mix well.  Add the flour and mix well. 
Roll this into a 2 inch roll.  Wrap in plastic and chill.........30 minutes in the freezer will do.  Use the refrigerator if you will chill longer.  You don't want to have to cut frozen dough.

Slice into 1/4 inch slices.  Bake at 350 degrees 10-15 minutes or so until crisp.

After they've cooled you can freeze them if you need to. This makes about 36.  Maybe a bit more.  I tasted some and kind of  lost track of how many I ate.