Chicken Pillows

Here's another recipe courtesy of Jared and Anita. We had it at their place before we moved out and I had to have the recipe. It was surprisingly simple to make and we really enjoyed it. I must add that Joseph ate it without a single protest. That's always a good sign!

Ingredients
2 chicken breasts
1 tbsp Olive oil
1 box cream cheese
2 garlic cloves or equivalent garlic powder
1/2 purple or sweet onion
Salt and Pepper
3 cans crescent rolls
1 can Cream of Chicken soup
3 tbs butter
1/3 cup bread crumbs

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Brown chicken in medium skillet with 1/2 tbsp olive oil over medium heat until cooked throughout. Remove from pan and chop finely with food chopper. Return to heated pan and add remaining 1/2 tbsp olive oil, finely chopped onion and pressed garlic or garlic powder. Heat over medium heat for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and place in medium mixing bowl. While the mixture is still hot, mix in entire box of cream cheese. Salt and pepper to taste. Each tube of rolls will yield two pillows. Unroll the rolls. Where the dough is diagonally perforated, overlap the dough slightly and reattach it by pressing it together. So take the two triangles, and make a rectangle. You should end up with 4 rectangles from each tube. It's best to have it on the baking sheet before you start assembling. It's not easy to move after you put them together. Place about a 1/3 cup of the goodness on top and in the center of one of the rectangles. "Cap" it with another rectangle by laying it on top of the mixture and pressing the edges together. Brush each pillow with melted butter and sprinkle on the bread crumbs. Cook for about 15-20 minutes. While they're baking, prepare the soup using milk (like making tomato soup.) Spread the soup on the pillows once you serve them on the plates.

Hamburgers

We had hamburgers a few weeks ago before I really started blogging here. At the time, we had more meat than we needed, so I decided to pre-shape some of them and freeze them for another time. That was what we ate a few nights ago. However, I neglected to get a picture of the patties all neatly frozen, nor did I take one before I had already bitten into my hamburger. So excuse the partially eaten hamburger picture. I took it, so I just had to use it. Anyhow, this had two stages.

Stage 1: Making the patties

Ingredients
1 lb. ground beef or turkey (we use turkey all the time)
1/2 cup bread crumbs
1 egg
liberal dousing (maybe a tbsp) of Alpine Touch (an all-purpose seasoner with garlic, salt, onion and pepper.)

You can season it in a multitude of ways. I've used worchestershire sauce, and tons of different combinations. What is listed above is our generic hamburger recipe. In the burgers shown above, I even added some grated cheddar cheese, instead of slicing it and adding it later on. It was a success, I'd say.

For shaping this burgers, this is the format. Choose how big you want them to be. Quarter pounders is quite big, but sometimes it's just the right size. With the recipe above, you can make 4 larger burgers, or you can make anywhere from 5-7 smaller burgers. Just realize that if you don't get them real skinny they will plump up when cooking and that can make them seem smaller in comparison to the bun. I used two sheets of wax paper. Put the amount of meat you want to use between the two and shape. (The wax paper keeps your hands from getting really sticky and gross) Keep in mind if you choose to use turkey, that the meat will be significantly more sticky and soft. After shaping, you may immediately grill, or freeze for later use.

Stage 2: Cooking or freezing

If freezing shape the patties, then stack them with a piece of wax paper between each patty. Make sure the wax paper is large enough to separate the meat patties from touching. Then place the stack of patties in a bag and plop in the freezer until you want to cook them! Upon removing them, you may have to pry them apart with a butter knife. However, the wax paper comes off really easily. Then plop right on a hot grill. They don't take too long to cook. I found that the pre-frozen patties tended to hold their shape better and make better patties. When you don't freeze them, they puff up while cooking, which makes them smaller in comparison to the buns. It's a technicality, but I liked them better that way. In freezing them, you can also make more than one batch at a time, so you have some on hand at the last minute.

Best Biscuits Ever!

I love these biscuits. I got the recipe in my cooking classes at the Y. We would seriously make these with any meal type dish we were making in lab because they're easy and absolutely delicious! Anyone who took that class is addicted to these biscuits. They are called Baking Powder Biscuits.

Ingredients

1 ¾ cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup cake flour
½ tsp salt
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tbsp sugar
½ cup vegetable shortening
¾ cup milk

Preheat oven to 425. Combine dry ingredients in medium bowl. Cut in shortening until mixture resembles coarse meal. Add milk all at once and stir just until dough forms a ball. Turn the dough onto a lightly floured board and knead 12 times. Pat or roll ½ inch thick. Cut into rounds with 2 inch cutter. Bake on greased baking sheet for 15-20 minutes or until golden brown and flaky. (You can substitute all regular flour. I use cake flour because who wants to mess with a good recipe, right? But using all all-purpose flour works as well.)

I would only cook mine for 12-13 minutes. It all depends on your oven. I don't like them to get too golden brown. Just slightly golden. Although I'm sure if you were cooking on a good sheet vs. the stuff I have, it might cook a bit different. I tend to get around 10-12 biscuits from this. I just use a glass cup to cut mine out. With this recipe I used a plastic kiddie cup, so they're a bit smaller than usual. These were cooked about two minutes longer than I'd recommed, so you can get an idea for the coloring.  Add some butter and jam. Mmmm.

 

Oatmeal

My favorite oatmeal is maple and brown sugar. However, we don't generally buy it,  but we have lots of plain oats. So I eventually came up with my own way to make it. I must say, it's not half bad!

Ingredients
1 3/4 cup water
1 cup quick oats
1/4 cup brown sugar (not packed)
1/8 tsp mapleine (like in homemade syrup)

If it's not seasoned enough for you, you can easily add more. I add all the seasoning after the oats are cooked according to the directions. These rations are for 2 servings (per the label on the oatmeal). Joseph really likes it. He puts raisins in his.

Junior Wellingtons

This is one of those recipes I found in a cookbook I happened to have and decided to give it a go. It's a bit heavy on the meat (which can be adjusted easily), but it's really flavorful and we all like it!

Ingredients
1 ½ lbs lean ground beef
3 egg yolks
¼ cup buttermilk
4 ½ tsp Worcestershire sauce
1 tbsp Baby Bam
1 tbsp minced garlic
1 tsp Italian seasoning
½ tsp salt
2 tbsp flour
3 sheets frozen puff pastry, thawed
1 tbsp water
6 slices American cheese

Combine the beef, 2 egg yolks, buttermilk, Worcestershire sauce, Baby Bam, garlic, Italian seasoning, and salt. Stir well. Divide the meat into 6 equal portions. Form into patties. Brown thoroughly on both sides in skillet. Refrigerate browned patties for 30 minutes. Heat oven to 425. Line baking sheet with parchment paper. Roll out pastry sheets to 1/16-inch thickness and cut into four even sections. Combine remaining egg yolk with water and beat with whisk to make egg wash. Place 4 pastry sections on baking sheet and paint a border of egg wash around each section. Place a chilled hamburger patty in the middle of each section and top with 1 slice of cheese. Top cheese with remaining pastry sections, pressing the edges together with a fork to seal. Paint the top with egg wash and cut an ‘X’ in the top of each Wellington. Bake until golden brown, about 15-20 minutes.

That's the official recipe. However, when I did it I only used 1 lb. of meat, 2 pastry sheets and 4 pieces of cheese. I didn't alter the seasoning too much. It still came out great. I don't bother cutting out circles. Then you have leftover pastry sheet with nothing to do with it. What a waste! I just cut mine in squares and use the whole thing. The patties are 1/4 lb, so they're pretty meaty. So for me, the more pastry, the better the balance. I think next time I'll even add some grated carrots. Anyhow, it's a flavorful meal, the pastry sheets are fun and add variety. Oh, here's the recipe for "Bam". (If you didn't notice, this is an Emeril recipe.)

Ingredients

3 tbsp paprika

2 tbsp salt

2 tbsp dried parsley

2 tsp onion powder

2 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp ground black pepper

1 tsp dried oregano

1 tsp dried basil

1 tsp dried thyme

½ tsp celery salt

This obviously makes a bit. It lasts for a while. I'll eventually put up more recipes that use Bam. I've also used it randomly. It's a nice all-purpose seasoner with kick.

Parmesan Chicken

I made this to originally go in my cream of broccoli soup, but didn't know how the breading would handle being in the soup, so we ate it on the side. This is a great recipe that's really easy to whip up and cook in the oven while you're doing other things. The chicken comes out super moist and it's really tasty. It's also easy to play with if you want to add other seasonings to the breading.

Ingredients

6 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
2 tbsp margarine, melted
½ cup grated parmesan cheese
¼ cup dry bread crumbs
2 tbsp flax seed
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp parsley
¼ tsp paprika
¼ tsp salt
¼ tsp pepper

Heat oven to 400. Spray 15x10x1” pan with Pam. Dip chicken in margarine, coat with combined remaining ingredients. Place in prepared pan. Bake 20-25 minutes or until tender. Chicken tenders may be substituted.

Using chicken tenders or cutting up the chicken breast into smaller pieces makes them very child friendly. Joseph really likes this. I've cut them up into strips. You still cook them the same. Oh yeah, flax seed wasn't in the original recipe. That was me :) You can add less flax seed if you like, as well. I just pick an amount that seems good.

Cream of Broccoli Soup

Yesterday wound up being a cold and dreary day, so it was lucky I had already planned to have Cream of Broccoli Soup! It's not too difficult and I just love a creamy soup.

Ingredients

2 cups water
4 tsp chicken bouillon granules
20 oz frozen chopped broccoli
2 tbsp finely chopped onion
2 cans condensed cream of chicken soup
2 cups evaporated milk
2 cups sour cream (16 oz)
1 tsp dried parsley flakes
¼ tsp pepper


In a large saucepan, combine the water and bouillon. Add broccoli and onion. Bring to a boil; reduce heat. Simmer for 10 minutes or until broccoli is crisp-tender. Combine soup, milk, sour cream, parsley and pepper; add to broccoli mixture. Cook and stir for 3-5 minutes or until heated through.

I really enjoy this recipe and as long as the broccoli pieces aren't too big, Joseph is able to eat it (and enjoy it) too.