Game Day Eats: Kickin' Chicken Philly

We're getting close to kick-off for the Super Bowl, so it's time for another game day idea. Of course, chicken wings are popular dish. So are sandwiches. So try out this recipe that combines the best of both worlds.

The very first recipe I posted on this blog was a copycat of one of my favorite sandwiches at a restaurant here called Two Guys Grille. Well, since then I've found a new favorite at Two Guys called the Kickin' Chicken Philly, so I decided to try my own version.

Now as you may know, as a native of the Philadelphia area, I'm something of a cheesesteak purist. The cheesesteaks/chicken cheesesteaks at Two Guys typically include green peppers, but green peppers are not a traditional ingredient in a cheesesteak (You can usually find a pepper steak on the menu at real cheesesteak places, but it's usually at the bottom of the menu. Bottom line is that green peppers are NOT a staple ingredient.), so I leave them out. The Two Guys sandwich also calls for jalapenos, and I've just never been the biggest fan, so I left them out. You, of course, are welcome to add back in the peppers as you wish.

Ingredients (per sandwich)
1 chicken breast, thinly sliced
Olive oil
Chopped onion
Sliced mushrooms
Hot sauce/Buffalo wing sauce to taste
2 slices white American cheese
1 hoagie roll

Directions
Slice a chicken breast as thinly as you can. The thinner the better. Marinate the chicken in the hot/wing sauce.

On a hot griddle or frying pan, heat up a little olive oil. When it's hot, add the onions and cook a little. Push them out to the edge and add the chicken. Turn over the sliced chicken and add the mushrooms. Mix the chicken, mushrooms and onions together until the chicken and mushrooms are cooked. Top with cheese slices and continue to heat until the cheese starts to melt. Pile everything into a hoagie roll.

You can top your sandwich with what you'd like. In this case, I added some ketchup and tomato slices. If I'd had some lettuce, I would've added that, as well.

Game Day Eats: Bacon Mushroom Sliders

Looking for some meal ideas for Super Bowl Sunday? I'll give you a couple new ones this week starting  with this one.

To be honest, I'm not sure what all the fascination the last several years has been with "sliders." For those that don't know, sliders are just small hamburgers. They get their name, as I understand it, from the tendency of White Castle burgers to slide right through you. In the last decade, though, they've become something of a culinary, but when all is said and done, they're just small hamburgers.

I decided to make them, to get my two-year-old to try something different, and it worked. So be creative with these and do with them what you'd like.

Ingredients
1 lb ground beef
A few dashes of Worcestershire sauce
Garlic powder
3 slices of bacon
3 slices of cheese
Sliced mushrooms
Slider rolls (or small dinner rolls)

Directions
Fry up the bacon until crisp. Saute the mushrooms in some of the bacon drippings. Keep bacon and mushrooms warm on the side.

Mix the beef with Worcestershire sauce and garlic powder. Divide it up to make six small patties. Grill the burgers or cook them in a frying pan. Two to three minutes on each side should be plenty. Top each with half a slice of bacon, half a slice of cheese and some mushroom slices, plus your favorite burger toppings.

As I said, the little man like these burgers built to his scale. He also enjoyed the baked sweet potato fries on the side.

Chicken & Vegetables in White Wine Sauce

Here's another easy and tasty recipe that's sure to please. As is often the case with my recipes, feel free to change the ingredients to suit your taste.

Before you get started, there's an important tip about cooking with wine. In the grocery store you can find what's called cooking wine. DO NOT BUY IT! Any chef will tell you this simple rule: If you wouldn't drink it, don't cook with it. That does not mean you have to be a wine connoisseur. Just use what you like. If you're not a wine drinker, just ask a friend or someone at the store. I used Barefoot Chardonnay with this. And of course, if you use a wine you like to drink, it makes it very easy to find the right wine to pair with the meal!

Ingredients
2 tbsp olive oil
1 pound chicken cut into bite-sized pieces
1 cup chopped carrots
1/2 cup chopped onions
2 gloves garlic chopped
1 cup sliced mushrooms
1 envelope onion soup mix
1 cup white wine
2 cups cooked rice (I used Jasmine rice, which adds a nice aromatic flavor, but use whatever you have/like)

Directions
Cook rice according to directions.

In a large skillet, heat olive oil over medium high heat. Brown chicken until almost done. Add carrots, onions and garlic and cook until veggies start to soften. Add mushrooms and cook another minute or two. Slowly add wine and scrape bits off bottom of pan. Stir in onion soup mix. Bring to boil, reduce heat to low and simmer 5-10 minutes. Serve over rice.

As you can see, I served it with a side of broccoli to add a little more color to the dish. The kids should love it, too!

Veggie & Turkey Sausage Lasagna

I know, I've been very slack lately posting recipes, but I'm gonna try to do better with several in the can, as we say in TV.

This recipe is another lesson in Italian cooking, as I long ago promised, but an intermediary step. It is lasagna, but not traditional in a couple of senses. One way is the ingredient. The other is a short-cut in the cooking.

This is something I came up with kind of on the fly. We were looking for a big family dinner with leftovers that had some nutritional value. So I lasagna took care of the first part. Vegetables took care of the second. This is also another of those recipes you can tweak for whatever your taste.

Ingredients
2 tbsp olive oil1 lb turkey sausage (removed from casings and crumbled)
1 cup chopped onion
3 cloves garlic chopped
1 cup chopped carrots
1 cup broccoli florets
1 zucchini sliced
1 cup sliced mushrooms
Handful fresh basil
2 jars tomato sauce (whatever kind or kinds you like)
1 box no-cook lasagna noodles
1 lb ricotta
1 lb shredded cheese (I believe I used one bag of Italian recipe and one Taco blend)

Directions
Heat the olive oil in a large skillet or wok (a wok is actually ideal for later). Brown sausage. When it's about done, add onion, garlic, carrots and broccoli, and cook until they start to get soft. Add zucchini, mushrooms and basil, and cook until they start to get soft. Add a little sauce and the ricotta. Cook until the whole mixture is well mixed and starts to get a little bubbly.

Spread some sauce in bottom of a large roasting pan (aka lasagna pan). Place a third of the lasagna noodles (no need to cook these) on top of the sauce. Spread some more sauce on top of noodles. Spread half of the sausage/veggie/cheese mixture, and sprinkle with some of a third of the shredded cheese. Top with another third of noodles, then more sauce, then the rest of the mixture, a third of the shredded cheese, last of noodles, more sauce, last of shredded cheese. Sprinkle some Italian herbs on top if you'd like, and yes, I like!

Cover pan with foil and bake at 375 for 30 minutes. Remove foil and bake for another 15 minutes until the whole thing is bubbly and melty. Yes, those are technical culinary terms.

Congratulations. You have made lasagna. Eventually we'll get to the real deal, but like I said at the top, this is a great intermediary step to learn some of the basics.

Serve this up with salad, garlic bread and the rest of the sauce heated.

We fed four adults and a child, and still had about half to put in the freezer for another day plus a couple servings for lunch at work the next day. I originally planned to make it with much less of the sausage, but I'm glad I used it all. It added a great flavor! You could make it without meat at all, but again, I think you'd lose a lot of flavor.

Gold Medal Meals: Beef Stroganoff

OK. I admit it. I dropped the ball. An out-of-town weekend trip and the busyness of life with two kids kept me from continuing my plan of a meal from a different nation each night of the Olympics. So on this night where London extinguished its cauldron, I decided to make one more Gold Medal Meal.

One of the traditions of the Closing Ceremonies at the Olympics is the hand-off to the next host city. In this case, London passes off to Rio De Jeneiro, Brazil, for the next summer games, but the next host is Sochi, Russia, home of the XXII Olympic Winter Games. So in honor of Russia, I decided to make Beef Stronganoff (or Stronganov).

As I often do, I searched for an easy recipe for the dish, and then added a few touches of my own. In addition to getting me back to the Olympic theme, this unlike many of the other Gold Medal Meals, fits with the theme of simplicity in cooking this blog targets.

Ingredients
12-16 oz package egg noodles
1 lb lean ground beef
1 cup chopped onion
3 cloves garlic chopped
1 cup sliced mushrooms
1 can Cream of Mushroom soup (low or reduced fat preferably)
1/2 cup sour cream
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions
In large pot of boiling water, cook noodles according to directions.

In large skillet over medium-high heat, brown ground beef. Just before it's all done, drain the grease. Stir in the onion, and cook two more minutes. Stir in garlic and mushrooms. Cook two more minutes, or until mushrooms are tender. Stir in soup, salt and pepper, bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer 8-10 minutes. Stir in sour cream, simmer two more minutes. Serve over noodles.

It's not the most photogenic dish, but it's pretty tasty, even if our little guy wasn't willing to give it a chance. My wife and I talked about how it would be an easy dish to hide some veggies, like diced carrots, by adding them in with the meat and other veggies.

Southern Classic: Shrimp & Grits

With the Mrs. home on maternity leave/summer break (she is a teacher), I've been spoiled a bit by coming home to a lot of dinners on the table. That means I haven't had a chance to do a lot of cooking myself, but today, I was back it.

If you've ever spent time in the South, you may have tried to the classic dish Shrimp & Grits. It is an incredibly delicious and versatile dish that can be enjoyed at any meal. We make it for Sunday dinners from time to time, but I guess traditionally it's a breakfast/brunch dish. Believe me, though, it's good  any time.

I found the basis for this recipe doing a search for "easy shrimp and grits" and finding a recipe on
"Southern Living" magazine's website from a restaurant in Chapel Hill, NC. I've adapted it just a little, by using a Vidalia (read: sweet) onion instead of green onions, as I normally have one on hand and like to think it adds a little more traditional southern flavor to the dish. I also use olive oil (again, I have it and like it), and use whatever shredded cheese that moves me for the cheese grits (tonight I used some Cheddar Jack and an Italian blend.

Now before we get down to the recipe, a very important piece of advice. You need to make this dish like you're on a TV cooking show. In other words, have everything measured out and ready to go. This is not a hard recipe, but it all happens quickly, and it's two dishes in one that must be cooked at the same time. I'll try to give you the timing as we go.

Ingredients
2-4 bacon slices
1 pound peeled, cleaned medium shrimp
Salt & pepper
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup sliced mushrooms
1 tablespoon olive oil (or just keep all the bacon drippings)
1/2 cup chopped Vidalia (sweet) onion
1 cup chicken broth
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
Hot sauce to taste

Cheese Grits
14 oz chicken broth
1 cup skim milk
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup quick cook grits
1 cup shredded cheese of your choice (the original recipe calls for 3/4 cup sharp Cheddar and 1/4 cup freshly grated Parmesan)
Hot sauce to taste
1/4 teaspoon ground white pepper


Cook the bacon in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat until crisp. Remove bacon, and drain on paper towels. Crumble bacon and set aside. Reserve 1 tablespoon drippings in skillet.

When the bacon is almost done, in a medium saucepan, combine 14 oz chicken broth, skim milk and 1/2 teaspoon salt and bring to boil over medium-high heat. Gradually whisk in grits. Lower heat and simmer for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Back in the skillet, sauté mushrooms in hot drippings with oil for 5 minutes or until tender. Add onions, and sauté 2 minutes.

As veggies cook, sprinkle some salt and pepper on the shrimp and dredge in flour. Add shrimp and garlic, and sauté 2 minutes or until shrimp are lightly browned. Stir in chicken broth, lemon juice, and hot sauce, and cook 2 more minutes, stirring to loosen particles from bottom of skillet.

Back to the grits: Stir in cheese, white pepper and hot sauce.

Spoon shrimp mixture over hot Cheese Grits; sprinkle with crumbled bacon.

It may not look like the prettiest dish in this photo, but it's delicious! My wife says it's as good as any version she's had in a restaurant. I served it with warm French bread. Also, as different people have different tastes, I like to add more hot sauce to my personal plate, but you do need a little while cooking for the flavor.

If you're making this for breakfast or brunch, serve it along with scrambled eggs and biscuits. Leftovers also go nicely with some eggs for breakfast. Enjoy!

Creamy Mushroom Chicken

Here's a recipe pulled straight out of the pantry. Every so often it's a good idea to see what you have sitting around and make something from it. In this case, the jumping off point was a can of Cream of Mushroom soup. The only thing I did not already have was the mushrooms. This whole thing should take about 30 minutes.

Here's what you'll need:

1 cup sliced mushrooms (or more depending on if you like mushrooms)

2 tbsp butter

1 can Cream of Mushroom soup

4 chicken breasts

Salt & pepper

1/4 cup flour

2 tbsp olive oil

1/4 cup chicken broth

In a skillet, melt the butter over medium-high heat. Saute mushrooms until soft. Move to a bowl and save for later.

In same skillet, heat olive oil. Pound chicken breasts to about 1/8 inch thick. Season on each side with salt and pepper. Dredge in flour. Brown in oil about 4-5 minutes on each side. Move chicken to a plate.

Add chicken broth to skillet and scrape up drippings and other bits in skillet. Add mushrooms back in along with Cream of Mushroom soup. Mix everything together over medium heat. Add in chicken and coat with soup mixture. Cover and simmer about 8-10 minutes or until chicken is done, turning chicken half way through.

 

Top with mushroom sauce to serve.

This would go great with some rice or egg noodles and a veggie. In the picture above, I served it with Au Gratin Potatoes (recipe to come), but the combo of creamy chicken and cheesy potatoes was a little heavy.

Chicken Lombardi

Tuesday (if she doesn't decide to arrive before the scheduled C-section) my wife and I will welcome our second child, a girl. As the big day approaches, I've put together some meals in the freezer so we won't have to worry about cooking in the coming weeks when we are exhausted beyond belief. Of course, there are batches of Baked Ziti of various sizes, but we decided to see if I could duplicate another great fix-ahead meal.

In my wife's hometown of Salisbury, NC, a family friend has a catering company/restaurant called L.A. Murph's. Among other things, it has take-and-bake meals that our in-laws often bring when they come to visit, including when our son was born a couple years ago. One of our favorites is the Chicken Lombardi (or Lombardy, but I'm going with the Italian spelling). We've been thinking for a while that we need to make our own, so I decided to make it the other night and put a batch aside for after the baby comes.

Having never made this before, I searched for a simple recipe that looked like it would be good. I found one on food.com, and it turned out pretty well, though I made a few tweaks. So having given full credit to the original, here's my version:

Ingredients1-2 cups sliced mushrooms
4-5 tbsp butter, divided
4 boneless skinless chicken breasts
flour
1-2 cloves garlic, chopped
3/4 cup Marsala wine
1/2 cup chicken broth
salt and pepper
1/2 cup shredded mozzarella or Italian blend cheese

Preheat the oven to 450.

Before you get cooking, you need to get the chicken breasts nice and thin. The best way is to cover them with a sheet of plastic wrap and pound them until about 1/4-inch thick. If you don't have a meat hammer/tenderizer, I've heard you can also roll them thin with a rolling pin.

Heat up a skillet over medium/high heat, melt 2 tbsp butter and saute the mushrooms. When they're tender, set them aside in a bowl.

Melt the rest of the butter in the skillet. Dredge the chicken in flour and brown (about 3-4 minutes on each side). Put the chicken in a baking dish coated with cooking spray. Top with the cooked mushrooms.

Keep the skillet on the heat. Add the garlic and brown a bit. Pour in the wine and broth slowly (it'll steam, splatter and hiss). Scrape the pan to loosen up all the drippings, garlic and bits o' chicken, etc. Season with a little salt and pepper. Bring to a boil. Lower the heat to medium/low and simmer for about five minutes. Pour over the chicken and mushrooms. Sprinkle with cheese. Bake at 450 for 12-15 minutes, or until cheese starts to brown.

The picture below shows the dish before it's topped with cheese and baked. Some how I forgot to take a picture afterward. Next time I make it, I'll try to remedy that.

 

We like it with some rice (like a boxed rice mix) and veggies. You could also do mashed potatoes.

Like I said, I made a batch (and later another) to freeze for another night. Instead of using a baking dish, I used an 8x8 aluminum pan. I bought three of these for about $2 at the grocery store.

I suggest letting it cool a bit, then putting the shredded cheese on top. Wrap it up with a few layers of plastic wrap. Let it cool completely in the refrigerator, then put it in the freezer.

To serve it later, you're best off defrosting it completely, then following the normal bake instructions. If not, you can bake it longer and lower. Try 400 for about 45 minutes.