Lots of Seafood this Week

I neglected to renew my domain name. Ooops! It's gone and I doubt I will play $60 to get it back from the company who is holding it hostage. For the time being you can find my recipe archive at www.homewithmandy.blogspot.com and I may be doing a re-branding later this year. We will see what happens.

Let's get back into the swing of regular blog posts shall we? This was our menu from last week and I mostly appreciated how quickly everything came together each night. There are times when I relish the long list of ingredients I chop and tend to. This was not that week.

Italian Mussels: Mussels are one of our favorite meals to cook and eat on a weekend. I do my grocery shopping on the weekend and this is an item you really don't want sitting in your fridge, it is best to cook it the day you buy them. Mussels are also a fabulous dinner party food because I serve them family style in a big shallow bowl. I have changed up the recipe over the years to keep things interesting, but my standby is posted here. I now add 2-3 sausage links to the pot while I'm softening the vegetables. The way I do it is to squeeze 1/2 inch size balls of meat out of the casings right into the pot. I like how rustic it makes the finished dish in the end.

Morton's Steak Bible: Chicken Christopher

I was given the Morton’s Steak Bible as a gift last year and made the well loved Chicken Christopher for Jim as soon as I had the recipe. The Beurre Blanc sauce (like everything else in the book) is full of butter. Lots and lots of butter. But this chicken dish is SO good.

Morton’s label this a French-style sauce that is easy to make and endlessly versatile. Cooking the wine until it nearly evaporates adds great flavor to the sauce, and adding the buter a tablespoon at a tme turns it silken. Take your time when you make this; you will be rewarded with a smooth, satiny sauce with subtle but gorgeous flavor. You can serve this with salmon, chicken, shrimp or over pasta.

I’m in the mood to make this again and blog about it so here is what you need to make about 2 cups Beurre Blanc sauce.

1 teaspoon Clarified Butter
1 large shallot, minced (about ¼ cup)
1/3 cup dry white wine (I’m using Bonterra Chardonnay)
3/4 cup heavy cream
3/4 cup (1 ½ sticks) unsalted butter, softened
1 teaspoon salt

Freshly ground white pepper
One thing I’m trying to do is prep all my ingredients at the beginning before I start cooking. Here is what everything looks like measured out.
Let’s talk about Clarified Butter or "Ghee." I can only find it at Whole Foods, my HEB and Randall’s does not carry it. The reason Morton’s suggest using clarified butter is because it can be heated to higher temperatures, and because the milk solids have been removed, it keeps very well. When refrigerated, it solidifies and turns a little grainy, but melts easily and becomes liquid again.

If you cannot find clarified butter, here is how you can make 1 cup yourself:

15 tablespoons unsalted butter
9 tablespoons unsalted margarine

1. In a small saucepan over medium heat, combine the butter and margarine. Cook for about 5 minutes, or until completely melted and simmering gently.
2. Remove from the heat and let stand at room temperature for about 10 minutes, or until the solids settle on the bottom of the pan. Skim the foam off the top and discard.
3. Carefully pour or ladle the, liquid butter into a storage container and leave the milk solids in the pan. Discard the solids. Let the butter cool and then refrigerate the clarified butter for up to 1 week.
   

Back to the recipe. Everything is prepped, we are ready to start the sauce. In a medium saucepan, heat the Clarified Butter over medium-low heat.
Add the shallot and sauté for 2 to 3 minutes or until it softens without coloring. (what does that mean? I have no idea. I simply set a 3 minutes timer.) Add the wine, raise the heat to medium-high, and bring to a boil.

Reduce the heat and simmer for 3 to 4 minutes, or until the wine reduces and the liquid coats the bottom of the pan. (Again, no idea what that description means, I simply set a timer for 4 minutes.)
Add the cream and simmer, stirring often, for 5 to 7 minutes, or until reduced by half.

Reduce the heat to low and begin adding the butter, a tablespoon at a time, whisking after each addition. Do not allow the cream to boil once the butter is added. I did this exactly as it told me to.
The sauce was beautiful, creamy and thick. The next step is to remove the pan from the heat. Using a handheld immersion blender, beat for 5 to 10 seconds, or until smooth. Lift the beater and then immerse again and beat for a few seconds. Repeat this process to produce a silken sauce. If you do not have a handheld immersion blender, do this in an electric mixer or by hand. The immersion blender does the best job.

Well, the immersion blender is on my wish list, so I used my blender.
Everything was perfect until this point. I think the blender is what threw me off. The recipe calls for the addition of lemon juice, salt and white pepper. I added this to the blender and pulsed for a few more seconds.
The recipe says “Add the lemon juice and salt and season to taste with pepper. Stir to blend. Strain the sauce through a fine-mesh sieve or a chinois into a small saucepan.”

When I strained back into my saucepan I thought right away that the sauce looked like it wasn’t incorporated, it was pulling a part.

Morton’s says to keep the sauce warm over low heat, making sure the temperature remains 110 to 120 F for up to 1 hour, or until ready to serve.

I did everything verbatim with the exception of adding the lemon, salt and pepper to the blender, and I think the sauce cooled off a little (just a little) while I made the chicken. But seriously I felt the sauce was falling a part as soon as I poured it from the blender.

On to the CHICKEN! It’s named for the Morton’s corporate chef, Chris Rook, who came up with the recipe several years ago. This dish is tender and light; the trick is to pound the chicken just enough that the pieces are uniformly thin and cook evenly and quickly. The recipe serves 6, I only made two chicken breasts, but I’m putting the full recipe here.

What you need for the chicken:
4 ½ pounds skinless, boneless chicken breasts
1 cup all-purpose flour
3 large eggs
3 to 4 cups bread crumbs
Salt and freshly ground white pepper
2 ¼ cups clarified butter
2 tablespoons chopped shallots
2 tablespoons minced garlic
3 cups Beurre Blanc
3 tablespoons chopped fresh curly-leaf parsley

Let’s start by prepping all our ingredients. I have an assembly line of flour, beaten egg and bread crumbs.

I like to put my chicken in zip top bags so that when I flatten them with my mega mallot their juice doesn’t spurt all over the place. You want an even thickness of about 1/2 inch.
Dry the chicken off with a paper towel.
Season with salt and pepper on both sides.
Chop the shallot.
Measure out 2 tablespoons minced garlic. I use garlic so much I just keep a large jar in the fridge.

I’m going to serve the Chicken Christopher and Beurre Blanc sauce over fettuccini so I got my water boiling and now add my noodles to cook for 10 minutes or until al dente.

Go ahead and take this time to chop your parsley too.
In a large sauté pan, melt 1 1/2 cups of the clarified butter over medium heat.
Now work your way down the assembly line. First dredge in flour, shaking off any excess.
Then dip the chicken in the egg wash, letting any excess drip back into the bowl.

Coat the chicken completely with the bread crumbs.

Add the chicken and cook for about 1 ½ minutes on each side, or until golden brown and crisp.
Looks Perfect!
Repeat with the rest of your chicken and then set aside on a platter.
Cover with foil to keep warm while you complete the sauce.

My fettuccini is complete and perfect. Drain.
In another pan (yes, this is like the fifth pan I’ve dirtied) melt the remaining 3/4 cup butter over medium heat and sauté the shallots and garlic for 1 to 2 minutes, or until translucent.

Add the Beurre Blanc and parsley, and stir well. When I picked up my Beurre Blanc sauce it was completely separated with cream particals on the bottom and oil-butter floating on the top. I didn’t think it could be saved, but I added it to the shallots and garlic anyway.
I thought I might cry at this point. At the time I wasn’t sure (and still am not positive) what I did wrong. I’ve done this before!! The sauce is awful, (smells wonderful) but looks and taste oily.

I poured it into a glass bowl to show you just what I was dealing with.

Jim walks in because the yummy smells from the kitchen are wafting into the living room. Before he can speak (and I know he’s about to say, “smells good, when is lunch going to be ready.”) I hold up a hand across the island and tell him I’m very upset because the sauce didn’t turn out and it would be best if he didn’t say anything. He kissed me on the back of my neck and left the kitchen.

This was upsetting, yes but I knew this wasn’t going to be a complete loss. I had two beautifully breaded and cooked chickens and perfectly cooked pasta….. what do I have on hand to save this meal?
Canned pastas sauce, fresh mozzarella and parmesan. Chicken parmesan here we come.
I removed the foil from the chicken and placed it on a baking pan, put my chickens on top and tore some mozzarella and placed on top.
I was so uderly flustered that I opened my pasta sauce over an open drawer and spilled. Slow down Mandy!
I put just a couple tablespoons of sauce on top of the mozzarella.

Then used my new zester to grate fresh parmesan on top of it all. Into the oven it went, under the 500 degree broiler for about eight minutes.
Meanwhile, I dumped the rest of the sauce on top of the linguini.
I was heartbroken that all those great ingredients in the beurre blanc were going to be tossed so I decided to try and save some. I strained the seperated liquid and was left with the parsley, garlic and shallots, and some bits of cream I think.
Gross.
I added about a tablespoon of the mush to the sauce. It tasted like strong garlic and onion so I didn't think it could hurt.

To my surprise, the meal looked great.
And obviously tasted good too!!

Star Party with Chicken Parm

A few friends of ours joined us on Saturday night for a Star Party out at Canyon of the Eagles. Jim and I had been hanging out at a friend’s pool all day, only leaving me 45 minutes to get home and whip up dinner for five before we went star gazing. I checked the pantry, the freezer, the fridge…it looked like I had all the ingredients for chicken parm.

Here is what you need for Chicken Parmesan:

Boneless skinless chicken breast
Flour
Egg
Breadcrumbs
Mozzarella
Olive Oil
Garlic
Onion
Red wine
Tomatoes

I started defrosting five chicken breast by putting them in the microwave on defrost. Then I get my big pot of water on the stove for the pasta. While the chickens are defrosting and water is heating up I diced an onion and threw that into a large skillet of hot olive oil to become translucent. The microwave wasn’t doing the trick, so I put the chickens in a zip top bag and submerged in hot water in the sink. Next, I added garlic to the cooked onions, then deglazed with a cup of red wine and let that boil down to about half. (This is the same sauce recipe I used with the homemade meatballs) The chickens were finally defrosted, using a mallet, I pounded to a one inch thickness. The sauce has boiled down, so I add a healthy pinch of Italian seasoning, 6 oz of tomato paste, one can stewed tomatoes and one can of diced tomatoes. I’m cooking for five here, so I need to make a lot of sauce. Okay, sauce is …done… sort of.

I turn the heat way down, add a lid and stick it on the back burner to simmer while I finish the chicken parm. Next, set up an assembly line for the chicken – flour, egg, breadcrumbs. I use three shallow bowls and first dip the chicken in my whole wheat flour, shake. Dip in my bowl of two beaten eggs that I added a 1/3 cup of milk to. Shake. Dip in Italian seasoned breadcrumbs last and then throw in hot skillet with some olive oil. Brown the chicken one at a time on both sides, about four minutes – then place in baking dish. I put a little sauce on the bottom of the dish, top the chicken with a slice of mozzarella, then add more sauce on top. Bake at 425 for 20 minutes.

During the baking time, I add my spaghetti to the boiling water and set a time for 10 minutes. Once al dente, I drain the pasta back into my large stock pot and pour the pasta sauce on top, mix well to coat. After the chickens are cooked through and my cheese has melted on top, I pull those out and plate up. First a pile of spaghetti, then a piece of chicken. Add a slice of garlic bread to the plate and serve with red wine!



This was a quick and no hassle meal and got all five of us fed and on the road to Canyon of the Eagles before sun set. The Austin Astronomical Society (AAS) host this event in a darkened star field in the Texas Hill Country bordering upper Lake Buchanan.
There was an observatory housing two big telescopes and about 15 more AAS members dotting the field with their personal telescopes, ready and waiting for you to approach them and ask what they were looking at. We saw Jupiter and its three moons. I tried really had to see the red spot on Jupiter, but didn’t. Saturn was amazing – it looked fake through the telescope, like a spaceship in the sky. Through the different telescopes we viewed planets, glowing gas cloud nebulae, star clusters, distant galaxies, and things that were many light years away. The most interesting tidbit I learned was the definition of a light year. I was looking at a star that was 27 light years away, which means that it takes 27 years for the light of that star to reach the earth – what I see in the sky is what that star looked like 27 years ago. Jim was the one who really got into this the most. I planned this event for him and he had a great time. Just talking to these members of AAS was fascinating. We saw a brilliant shooting star and one child explained “I saw a shooting star! I made a wish on it, but it didn’t come true. Wishes never come true…” One fo the instructors from AAS explained if the wish didn’t come true, then it wasn’t a shooting star you saw, it was just space junk burning up.

Next time we go to a Star Party, I would suggest packing a cooler, some munchies and folding chairs. Although they say you need to be there by sun set, you don’t really start seeing the brilliant night sky until 45 minutes after sun set. This is plenty of time to unpack a picnic and lay down under the beautiful Texas sky.