I have some college kids requesting recipes for things that can be made quickly and don’t require an extensive array of spices. What is one staple in every college student’s pantry? Ramen. With just a few additional ingredients, you can transform that ramen packet into a delicious and slightly more nutritious main dish salad.
RECIPE:
Filed under Main Dishes, Salads
“Comfort food” means something different to everyone. Our youngest child (soon to leave the nest and graduate into adulthood) has always been our pickiest eater. I gave up long ago on trying to see the logic in what she likes and dislikes. But one thing is consistent: she hates bland food. She wants nothing to do with hot dogs, hamburgers (or any variation like meatballs/meatloaf), pizza, roast chicken/turkey, and ANYTHING in gravy or a tomato-based sauce. But she LOVES most ethnic foods that come packed with flavor and spiciness. She especially loves Mexican and Asian cuisine (Chinese, Japanese, Indian, Thai, Vietnamese), with a few un-explainable exceptions.
So to her, comfort foods DO NOT include soups, stews, pot pie, roast beef or chicken, or pretty much any American food. Mapo tofu, however, is one of her very favorite meals. It is packed full of mouth-tingling flavor! And tofu (which is the blandest thing ever, but provides a nice texture in the spicy sauce).
Mapo Tofu (also spelled mabodofu) is a Szechuan dish that we first came to love while living in Japan. It is made with ground pork, tofu, chili paste, onions, garlic, and other Asian seasonings. The best place we have ever eaten it is in a Szechuan restaurant in Beijing; it was so spicy it was hard to swallow, but soooo good. When we moved back to the US, I needed to find a way to make it from scratch.
In addition to other ingredients, I use a few tablespoons of this spicy bean sauce to flavor my mapo tofu. This requires a special trip to an Asian market for me, but that is one of my favorite outings, and the family loves it when I also come home with Aloe drinks, ramune, and senbei snacks.
Part of the flavor of this dish comes from ground Szechuan peppercorns, which are unique because they are not especially spicy (that quality comes from other ground peppers). But they cause a slightly numbing sensation to your tongue when you eat them.
So as our weekend forecast is for cold and snow, this is what our Little J hopes to see on the menu!
RECIPE:
Filed under Main Dishes
The best fried rice starts with cold rice. Hot, steamy rice will lead to more sticky and gummy fried rice.
Starting with cold rice makes this a quick and easy meal when you have leftover rice in the refrigerator. And it is always a kid pleaser.
I like to cook the eggs omelet-style and then cut them into thin strips when I make fried rice, but you can also cook them like regular scrambled eggs.
RECIPE:
6 cups cold cooked rice (about 2 cups uncooked rice, cooked and chilled)
3 eggs, lightly beaten
2-3 Tbs olive oil or butter
2 cups chopped raw vegetables (assorted): celery, broccoli, carrots, snow or snap
peas, mushrooms, zucchini, red peppers
1-2 cups chopped cooked ham, bacon, or chicken
Sliced green onions to garnish
Sauce:
½ cup chicken broth
½ cup soy sauce
1 garlic clove, minced
½ tsp minced fresh ginger
½ tsp chili paste
1 Tbs rice vinegar
1 Tbs honey
1 Tbs sesame oil
Combine sauce ingredients in a small bowl and set aside.
Heat 1 tsp of oil or butter in a small non-stick skillet. Cook eggs (in 3 batches) omelet style. Cut each omelet into thin strips. Set aside. **See Note Below for alternate egg cooking method**
In a large skillet, heat 2 Tbs olive oil or butter. Sauté vegetables until crisp tender. Stir in cooked ham or chicken and heat through. Stir in cooked rice. Cook for 2-3 minutes. Stir in sauce and cook for about 5 minutes or until rice is heated through and sauce is absorbed. Stir in egg strips. Garnish with sliced green onions.
**Alternate cooking method for eggs: If you want scrambled eggs and not egg strips in the fried rice: After adding the meat to the skillet, push the vegetables and meat over to one side of the skillet. Add the beaten eggs to the other side of the large skillet and stir gently until cooked through. Stir in rice and sauce, as directed above.
NoEmptyChairs.me
Filed under Main Dishes
Always a family favorite, this stir-fry comes together quickly for a last minute dinner.
Because the dried peppers are left whole in this recipe, it is not spicy. If you like a little more heat, simply cut up the peppers on your plate and eat them along with the stir-fry.
Szechuan peppercorns and Chinese black vinegar can be found in Asian markets or online. The peppercorns usually come whole. You can use any pepper mill/grinder to crush them. You can also use a small coffee grinder to grind the peppercorns.
RECIPE:
3 chicken breasts, diced
2 Tbs soy sauce
1 Tbs sherry
2 tsp grated fresh ginger
1 clove garlic, minced
½ tsp ground Szechuan peppercorns
2 Tbs oil
8-10 dried small red chilis (Arbols)
1 medium carrot, peeled and diced
2-3 stalks celery, diced
1 small onion, diced
½ cup roasted peanuts
1 bunch green onions, sliced diagonally into 1 ½” pieces
Sauce:
1/3 cup chicken broth
3 Tbs soy sauce
1 Tbs sherry
1 Tbs Chinese black vinegar or rice vinegar
1 ½ Tbs cornstarch (or scant 1/8 tsp xanthan gum)
1 Tbs sugar (or low-carb sweetener)
1 Tbs sesame oil
Combine chicken with 2 Tbs soy sauce, 1 Tbs sherry, ginger, garlic, and ground peppercorns. Marinate 1 hour.
Combine sauce ingredients and set aside.
Heat 1 Tbs oil in large skillet or wok over high heat. Add whole dried chilis to hot oil and cook until they just begin to blacken. Remove chilis from oil and place in serving dish. Add vegetables to the hot oil in pan and cook over high heat until crisp-tender. Remove from pan and place in serving dish. Add additional 1 Tbs oil to pan. Add chicken to pan and cook over high heat until chicken is cooked through. Reduce heat to medium, add sauce to pan, and cook until thickened (2-3 mins). Stir in peanuts, green onions, vegetables and chilis. Heat for 1 minute.
Serve over rice.
NoEmptyChairs.me
Filed under Main Dishes
Teriyaki Chicken is an easy and delicious way to grill chicken. You can also broil it in the oven if summer storms roll in just as you are getting the grill ready.
I like to use boneless chicken thighs when I make this. They are moist and tender and less likely to dry out when grilled.
RECIPE:
6-8 boneless chicken thighs or 4 boneless chicken breasts
Sauce:
½ cup soy sauce
3 Tbs brown sugar
1 Tbs sherry (or rice vinegar)
3 cloves garlic, minced
½ tsp fresh ground ginger
½ tsp cornstarch + 2 Tbs water
Combine all sauce ingredients, except for cornstarch/water mixture, in a Pyrex measuring cup. Microwave for 1 minute, or until sugar completely dissolves. Cool.
Place chicken in a Ziploc bag. Add about 1/3 cup of the sauce to the bag and let chicken marinate for 1 hour to overnight. Grill or broil chicken until cooked through.
Stir cornstarch/water mixture into remaining sauce and mix well. Heat in a small saucepan, stirring constantly, until thickened and smooth.
Brush cooked chicken with glaze and serve with rice.
NoEmptyChairs.me
Filed under Main Dishes
Today’s post comes to you courtesy of Little J.
For a class assignment, Little J had to make a Family Favorite Recipe all on her own. This included planning, shopping, cooking and clean-up. This is my very favorite type of homework assignment! She chose to make a chicken stir-fry. Definitely one of her favorite meals.
My favorite thing about stir-fries is how adaptable they are to whatever you can find in your freezer and produce drawer. Little J chose to use chicken, fresh green beans, celery, carrots and onion in her stir-fry.
The recipe below is for a basic stir-fry that you can customize to your family’s taste. I also included Little J’s customization.
I look forward to more amazing creations from this amazing daughter!
RECIPE:
1-2 lb thinly sliced chicken breasts OR thinly sliced beef (flank steak, skirt steak, or leftover roast beef) OR thinly sliced pork tenderloin
3-4 cups chopped fresh vegetables (onions, broccoli, green beans, carrots, celery, mushrooms, pea pods, asparagus, cabbage, red or green peppers, green onion—whatever is in the fridge!)
2-3 Tbs oil
Sauce:
½ cup chicken broth
¼ cup soy sauce
1 Tbs cornstarch
1 Tbs honey
1 Tbs rice wine vinegar
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tsp grated ginger
2 tsp chili paste
2 tsp sesame oil
Combine sauce ingredients in a small bowl or glass measuring cup. Stir until cornstarch and honey are completely dissolved. Place sliced meat in a Ziploc bag and add ¼ cup of the sauce to the bag with the meat. Close bag and set aside.
Heat 1 Tbs oil in a large skillet or wok. Sauté vegetables over high heat until crisp- tender. Work in small batches, removing vegetables from the pan when they are cooked (add additional oil if needed). Place cooked vegetables in serving dish.
Add 1 Tbs oil to pan; heat until hot. Add meat to pan and cook over high heat until meat is cooked through (about 5 minutes). Reduce heat to medium-low and add sauce to pan. Cook until sauce thickens (2-3 mins). Stir in cooked vegetables. Cook 1 minute to heat through.
Serve over rice.
NoEmptyChairs.me
4 boneless chicken breasts, thinly sliced
2 cups fresh French green beans, cut into 1-2” pieces
1 onion, thinly sliced
2 stalks celery, sliced
1 medium carrot, peeled and sliced
2-3 Tbs olive oil
Hot cooked rice
Sauce:
½ cup chicken broth
¼ cup soy sauce
1 Tbs cornstarch
1 Tbs honey (or golden low-carb sweetener)
1 Tbs rice wine vinegar
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tsp grated ginger
2 tsp chili paste
2 tsp sesame oil
Combine sauce ingredients in a small bowl or glass measuring cup. Stir until cornstarch and honey are completely dissolved. Place sliced chicken breasts in a Ziploc bag and add ¼ cup of the sauce to the bag with the chicken. Close bag and set aside.
Heat 1 Tbs oil in a large skillet or wok. Sauté vegetables over high heat until crisp- tender. Work in small batches, removing vegetables from the pan when they are cooked (add additional oil if needed). Place cooked vegetables in serving dish.
Add 1 Tbs oil to pan; heat until hot. Add chicken to pan and cook over high heat until chicken is cooked through (about 5 minutes). Reduce heat to medium-low and add sauce to pan. Cook until sauce thickens (2-3 mins). Stir in cooked vegetables. Cook 1 minute to heat through.
Serve over rice.
NoEmptyChairs.me
Filed under Main Dishes
Sugar Free Strawberry Cheesecake
Baseball/Softball Cookies
Peeps Cupcakes
Strawberry Lemonade Cake
Lemon Bars
Chocolate Covered Strawberries Cake
Strawberries & Cream Roll Cake
Easter Resurrection Rolls
Strawberry Nutella Muffins
Lime Glazed Raspberry Sweet Rolls
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