Archive for ◊ July, 2014 ◊

24 Jul 2014 Curried Chicken Meatballs with Apricot Rice Pilaf

curriedmeatballs01

I have a love-hate relationship with America’s Test Kitchen (and their related publications, Cooks Illustrated and Cooks Country).  I buy a LOT of their special interest publications. I like to read, and I enjoy reading recipes, and I like trying out new recipes. I like the pictures of each recipe and I like the all the notes that go along with each ATK recipe.  I have made some good things from ATK recipes, but I’ve made some not so good, too.  On the other hand, I hate, hate, hate, hate, hate that I cannot access any of the ATK recipes online without paying for them.  The only way around this is to get the name of the recipe you are interested in and Google it, or look on foodgawker or TasteSpotting for a hit, then go to a food blog, similar to this one, to get the actual recipe.  Compare this to Bon Appetit and Epicurious.  I subscribe to Bon Appetit, but even if I didn’t I could access all of their recipes for free on the Epicurious website, most of which have some wonderfully helpful comments.  I love being able to search Epicurious‘ recipe archives for any recipe they have published over the past years. I often find terrific recipes that way, searching on words such as “soup”,  “blueberries” and “brownies” and then scrolling through all the recipes with that key word. I don’t know why America’s Test Kitchen cannot do the same 😛

Anyways…, enough of my rant and onto my latest America’s Test Kitchen find!

The original recipe (by the same name) was from one of America’s Test Kitchen 30-minute Meals cookbooks.  The meatballs, although very simple with a very plain list of ingredients, are quite tasty and virtually perfect! I wanted to up the curry powder just a bit, but my offspring vetoed that idea,  saying they were good just as they are, so I left the meatball recipe alone (but I did “heap” the 1 T. of curry powder!).  I always make these meatballs with ground chicken, but I see no reason why ground turkey, ground beef, or ground lamb couldn’t be used. The 1 lb. of ground meat makes about 30-36 small meatballs.

I did change the pilaf recipe a quite bit, as ATK’s was much too bland. (Pilaf, by definition, contains rice cooked in broth, ATK version was cooked in water, and only got worse after that.) I substituted butter for vegetable oil, broth for the water and added a bit  more variety, and taste,  with additional veggies, herbs, and garnishes.  I also added a bit of salt and spice…, and the magical touch, a bay leaf and a long piece of lemon peel (both of which are fished out before serving).

I didn’t think it was true, but it was! I was able to make this, from start to finish, in 30-minutes…, AND it was a mighty tasty, spur-of-the-moment dinner!   Serve with a side of veggies, if you want, steamed broccoli would be good… 🙂

Curried Chicken Meatballs with Apricot Rice Pilaf

For Pilaf

  • 1 T butter (approx)
  • ½ -1 cup finely chopped onion (your favorite variety)
  • ½ -1 cup finely chopped mixed vegetables (celery, carrots, bell peppers…)
  • 1 cup long-grain white rice
  • 1 ¾ cups hot chicken broth (or water). OK to sub abut ¼ cup of liquid for ¼ cup white wine (another option: add one long strip of lemon, lime or orange peel-with no white pith attached, to the rice mixture when adding the liquid)
  • 2 bay leaves
  • ½ -1 teaspoon salt (if your broth is salted, you might not need to add too much additional salt)
  • ½ – 1 cup chopped dried apricots or mixture of apricots and other dried fruits (raisins, cherries, cranberries)
  • 1/2 cup toasted slivered almonds or other nuts (pistachios, pine nuts, chopped pecans)
  • 1/4 cup minced cilantro, parsley, basil, green onion, frozen peas, sautéed mushrooms or mint for last minute stir-in and garnish (choose one, maybe two…or three)

 For Meatballs

  • 1 pound ground chicken (or turkey)
  • ½ cup very finely minced raw onion (grated onion works well, too)
  • ½ cup panko bread crumbs
  • ¼ cup chopped fresh cilantro
  • 1 tablespoon curry powder (maybe a bit more…)
  • 1 teaspoon salt and ½ teaspoon pepper, or to taste

From start to finish: about 30 minutes

  1. In large saucepan, heat butter over medium-high heat until shimmering.
  2. Add chopped onions and cook until softened, about 4 minutes.
  3. Add rice and cook until mostly opaque, about 4 minutes.
  4. Stir in choice of mixed veggies
  5. Add broth and bring mixture to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover and cook until rice is tender, about 20 minutes. When cooked, remove from heat and let rice stand and steam until needed.
  6. Meanwhile, in large bowl, combine chicken, onions, panko, cilantro, curry powder, salt and pepper. Mix with fork until well blended.  Don’t overwork the meat mixture.
  7. Using wet hands (or a small scoop), shape mixture into 1-inch meatballs. (Depending on size, of course, makes about 30-36 meatballs)
  8. Heat a bit of oil in a large frying pan until hot.
  9. Add meatballs and cook until browned on all sides, about 5 minutes, shaking pan as needed.
  10. Cover the pan and steam meatballs over medium heat for an additional 5 minutes.
  11. Now turn your attention back to the rice. Take lid off the pan and gently fluff rice with a fork. Pick out the bay leaves and the optional lemon or orange peel.
  12. Add apricots/dried fruit mixture, toasted almonds/nuts and choice of stir ins to rice (reserve about 1 tablespoon, each, of nuts and green stir-ins). Stir to thoroughly incorporate all ingredients.
  13. Transfer pilaf to a serving platter, top pilaf with hot, browned meatballs, and then sprinkle the reserved 1 T. of  nuts and cilantro, parsley, mint or green onion over the top. Add a serving spoon and . . . .
  14. Dinner is ready! YUM!

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Thanks for stopping by my kitchen today 🙂  I hope that you make  and enjoy these and I hope they become a family favorite, as they have in my house!

20 Jul 2014 Toasted Coconut Waffles

coconut-waffle01 They taste like a tropical vacation!  I liked them with butter and apricot jam.  My kids were hollering for pineapple, mango, and some toasted nuts but I gave them what I had on hand, maple syrup and whipped cream (poor, poor deprived children). I cut this recipe out of a Bon Appetit magazine in December, 2013 but didn’t make them until July 2014. I’m glad I don’t clear my refrigerator of assorted clippings and notes and pictures all that often, and I am glad I saved this recipe for seven months! The note above the recipe states the recipe is from Elmwood Cafe in Berkeley.  I wonder what they serve them with… You’ll need some coconut oil for this recipe.  I don’t think it affects the taste much, but I think it adds to the delightful crunch.  I did make one change to the recipe, I reduced the amount of toasted coconut. Only ¾ cup of toasted coconut is incorporated into the batter, but the recipe stated to toast 1 ½ cups, using the extra ¾  to sprinkle on top of the cooked waffles, that’s way too much coconut for sprinkling, an extra ¼ cup will do you. I toasted the coconut and mixed up the dry ingredients before I went to bed, which made Sunday morning a bit easier.  I just had to stir in the eggs, milk, and coconut oil and heat up the waffle iron. The batter made 7 large, round waffles (which leaves some for us to throw in the toaster tomorrow morning). Word of advice, if you like waffles, and want to enjoy them on a regular basis, get two waffle irons.  The horrible thing about waffles is that it’s hard to get everyone a hot waffle at the same time.  Two waffles irons solves this problem–unless you have a really large family and need three waffle irons… It goes without saying that you have to like coconut (and the Hawaiian mojo) to like these waffles. But who doesn’t like coconut…, or Hawaii!? Toasted Coconut Waffles, take me awayyyyy. . . .

BTW, my notoriously picky 5 year old grandson, who at last count eats only 27 different foods (he has some sort of selective eating disorder), ate half a waffle and told me it was GOOD.  Hooray! I might be making these on a regular basis now, especially since scrambled eggs, a long time favorite, has slipped off of his list.  I just might have this recipe committed to memory by next month 🙂

Toasted Coconut Waffles

  • 1 cup shredded coconut (original recipe specified unsweetened, but I didn’t have any, so used sweetened coconut)
  • 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
  • ½ cup cornstarch (yes, my eyes popped, too.  Not a misprint.  On-half a cup of cornstarch!)
  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • ½ teaspoon baking soda
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 cup buttermilk (or soured milk)
  • 1 cup whole milk (I had whole milk on hand, so I used it, but I am sure 2% would be fine, too)
  • 2/3 cup coconut oil, melted
  • ½ cup sugar (use 2 tablespoons less if you are using sweetened shredded coconut)
  1. The original recipe said to preheat oven to 400°F, toast coconut on a rimmed baking sheet until golden brown, 2 minutes. then let cool. I find it easier to toast the coconut in a dry frying pan over medium heat.  Just keep stirring and then watch closely.  Once the coconut is a nice golden brown remove it from the pan and let cool on a plate.
  2. Whisk flour, cornstarch, salt, baking powder, and baking soda in a large bowl (I did this the night before, covered, and left on counter).
  3. Whisk eggs, buttermilk, milk, oil, and sugar in a medium bowl. Whisk buttermilk mixture into dry ingredients (do not over mix). Mix in ¾ cup coconut; set aside remaining ¼ cup coconut for sprinkling on waffles.
  4. Heat a waffle iron until very hot.
  5. Ladle approx 2/3 cup of batter onto hot waffle iron, close lid, and cook waffles until golden brown (each waffle iron is different, but usually 4-6 minutes).
  6. Serve topped with your choice of toppings: butter, syrup, apricot/pineapple jam, diced fresh bananas/mango/pineapple, toasted pecans, whipped cream and reserved coconut.

Thanks for stopping by my kitchen today.  I hope you I’ll be offering up some recipes on a more regular basis now. I am home from an extended European vacation and pretty much convinced that what I make at home is better than anything anywhere else 🙂