Roasted Chicken Legs with Smoked Paprika, Blood Orange, and Ginger AND Bulgur "Pilaf" with Swiss Chard and Dried Apricots

I was sold on this chicken recipe from Cook This Now.  Orange, cilantro, jalapeno, smoked paprika.  I opted to bake boneless skinless thighs with the marinade and chose a side suggested in the recipe notes, a fragrant bulgur pilaf.  Both came together quickly and with a little advance prep, would be a perfect weeknight meal.  (I would recommend marinating the chicken ahead of time.)

A few little notes... I took the seeds out of the jalapeno and found the spice level to be good that way.  We baked the chicken for about 20 minutes and it was perfectly moist and tender.  The pilaf was an excellent accompaniment, though next time I will chop the chard more (instead of ribbons like I did this time).  I took the suggestion to drizzle pomegranate molasses on at the end and I highly recommend this.  I definitely intend to make both of these dishes again - the chicken especially, since it was super easy and I think would be great cooked on the grill as well as in the oven.

Roasted Chicken with Potatoes

Toward the end of April, I was trying to use up some of the biggest things in my freezer.  I had a whole chicken in there and decided it would be a good weekend project to figure out how to roast a whole chicken.  I turned to Mark Bittman (via How to Cook Everything) and I found not only several flavor options for roasting a chicken, but also how to add potatoes or roasted vegetables, and how to carve said roasted chicken.

Of course, I didn't actually touch this chicken at any point (what are boyfriends for?) but I did everything else.  I used rosemary from my new potted herb plants out on our balcony and I think it worked really well with the potatoes.

I certainly have no intention of regularly roasting chickens, but it's nice to know it's super easy!

Roast chicken with sumac, onions and pine nuts AND Hassan's cracked potatoes with coriander

Sam and Sam Clark's Moro East is the featured cookbook for January and February over on the 101 Cookbooks library.  These are the first of (hopefully) many recipes from Moro East that I'll be posting about!  The book is gorgeous and the recipes are inspiring.  I look forward to learning a little bit more about some of the unfamiliar ingredients used in the recipes.

Of course, I have a story to go with this.  The recipe calls for a whole chicken cut into 8 pieces.  I've never cooked like this before, so I asked the guy at the meat counter at Whole Foods for a whole chicken that was already cut into the pieces.  I even confirmed what I was asking for.  And of course he sent me home with a whole chicken, cut into NO pieces.  I hid in the bathroom while Ken cut it up.  It was gross :(  However, now I know from experience that this is totally unnecessary.  If I wanted to use all chicken breasts or thighs or whatever, it would have turned out fine.

The Roasted Chicken with Sumac, Onions and Pine Nuts was delicious.  You brown the chicken, take it out of the pan and dump the extra fat, drop in some onions and sumac, put the chicken back, sprinkle with more sumac and pine nuts, and pop it in the oven.  Super easy.  I look forward to seasoning chicken with sumac in the future.  It has a slightly lemony, not-too-strong flavor.  I used frozen pearl onions, but next time I'll probably use small onions cut into 8ths for a stronger flavor and because the layers will come apart - I just think it'll be better.  I'll also use fewer pine nuts.  They are so expensive now!

Hassan's Cracked Potatoes with Coriander went nicely with the chicken.  My favorite part of the recipe was cracking the potatoes.  I got to smash them with the flat side of a meat tenderizer.  Not too much, just enough to make some cracks.  I love the orange-y fragrance of coriander.  The wine was a fantastic addition that I was skeptical about at first, but after it was cooked, it added a great flavor to the potatoes.  I should have halved the recipe, because it didn't all fit well in the pot, but it worked out alright in the end.

One thing I did NOT like about these recipes was that I could feel how high in fat they were.  I'd like to use some of these flavors in more healthy dishes.  Now I know to trust my instincts with these recipes and cut down on some of the less healthy parts of them.

Wild Rice Medley with Braised Chicken in Balsamic-Fig Sauce

It's time to get back to cooking real meals.  There have been times when I could plan an ambitious week-long menu stuffed with recipes to try.  I never got to all of them.  Now, I can barely think of something for tonight's dinner, let alone lunch and dinner for any other day this week.  I've taken to making brief shopping trips almost every day to pick up just what I need.

This one was planned.  In an effort to get back to making dinners, I have been flipping through some of my books.  In the same book where I found my project, teff waffles, I found this lovely recipe for a wild rice medley with chicken and a delicious-sounding sauce.  I planned to make it on a day when I had a lot of time (Friday), because a quick glance at the cooking times showed me that it was going to take a while (which it did - I was working on this for about 1.5 hours).

It was worth the work.  I put a lot of time and effort into this and was rewarded with something delicious.  I have never braised anything and it came out fine.  We had a nice dinner out on the balcony :)

Quick Thai Chicken and Vegetable Curry

I want to use as much as possible of the little jar of Thai red curry paste before it goes bad. I read in one of the recipes that it will keep for about a month and I am approaching that point. I found this recipe from Eating Well magazine and it looked pretty similar to the slow cooker one, but with a greater variety of vegetables and (obviously) made on the stove instead. I made some brown jasmine rice to go with it, which absorbs the curry and makes it less liquidy (my personal preference).

I am glad I found this one because it was very, very good. The leftovers were lovely as well. I had it for lunch one day, and dinner the next, and there is still some left! You can estimate the amount of vegetables - I used a little more cauliflower - and you could probably add/swap some other things in here as well, if you have a handle on their cooking times. I definitely plan to make it again, and I might try it again with tofu instead of chicken.

Chicken and Eggplant Parmesan

Since school started I have been very busy and haven't really made anything new. But since it's a long weekend, I decided to try out a new recipe that I have been wanting to try for a while - Chicken and Eggplant Parmesan from Food Matters. I bought eggplant at the Rutgers Gardens Farmers Market on Friday (as well as some yummy white peaches and a pint of yummy homemade sour pickles) specifically for the purpose of trying this recipe. I like eggplant and I want to look for more ways to cook with it, but eggplant parm seems to be common so I think it was a good recipe to start with.

We started out trying to broil the eggplant, but we really don't have the proper cookware for that, so we quickly switched to our electric grill. Rather than making the All-Purpose Tomato Sauce, we used my Nonna's homemade sauce. The result was OK, but I didn't love it. Ken didn't like it. The parmesan was really good, since I used real parmesan, and the mozzarella was good too. I think one cup of bread crumbs was way too much, though. I would probably use half of that next time. I also totally forgot to mix in the olive oil, salt and pepper to the bread crumbs. Oops! I might make this again, but maybe not. I am trying to eat less meat, so this is probably the only chicken I will be having for a while, and I will definitely be eating veggie meals for the rest of the week.