Menu of the Week

Our menu of the week focused on fairly healthy dinners from Cooking Light. I tried a few new recipes and had to improvise on Wednesday when dinner took a nose dive. Keep reading to find out what dinners we enjoyed.

Girls Night Recipes

When my friends and I plan girls night, it always involves sinful snacking. If there were a night to fry something, this would be it. Lots of jokes (sometimes at my expense), lots of fried food, lots of wine, lots of chatter around the roar of a fire - no boys allowed. You won't find spicy chicken wings or philly cheese steaks anywhere near our buffet. Let me highlight some of our favorite snacks for girls night!

Fried zucchini slices, otherwise known as Zucca Chips are so perfect for girls night! For one, they are quick and easy. Secondly, these are delicious!

Be sure to buy at least one zucchini per person because they shrink up and we tend to eat these by the handfuls.

As soon as you pull them out of the fryer, allow them to drain on a paper towel and sprinkle with salt right away.

While we were at it, we also thinly sliced potatoes and fried them up as well.

Chicken Hash over Creamy Polenta

This was a totally random and made up dinner that ROCKED! I wanted something comforting, filling and wholesome - and I also wanted to use up produce that was on it's last leg in my house. I pulled every vegetable I had out of the fridge and then roasted two chicken breasts. All the ingredients are slow cooked in my dutch oven with wine and chicken stock and then served over the creamiest and most delish polenta. I didn't know what to call it, "everything but the kitchen sink chicken and veggies dinner?" Doesn't sound appetizing. A "hash" is a great way to maximize leftovers or use up produce before it spoils. Although a traditional "hash" usually contains potatoes of some sort, I replaced the starch with polenta and then named my recipe Chicken Hash over Polenta.

By the way, Jim is absolutely terrible at coming up with recipe names. I should start a list of his suggestions. My sweetie pie means well, but I'm pretty sure he would have named this "the really good chicken and vegetables."

Both Jim and I enjoyed this meal so much that I made it twice...and photographed it twice. I usually don't take pictures of a dish I've already posted, BUT I've made some improvements to my "kitchen studio."

I have invested in an EGO light and a small tabletop tripod. Can you tell the difference? Above is the new photo I took this week, below is my first run with this recipe that I took about a month ago. 

Here is the step by step photos from my first run at Chicken Hash over Polenta:

Zucca Chips

Zucca Chips are fried Zucchini and they are SO good. If you have a garden or have subscribed to a CSA then you are probably like me and have zucchini coming out your ears. A few weeks ago I had lunch at North, an Italian restaurant in one of Austin's newest shopping areas. One of their appetizers are these irresistable Zucca Chips. I was eating them by the handfulls and wondering how I could recreate these little bites at home.

I started with vegetable oil. I couldn't tell what kind of oil the restaurant used to fry the zucchini, but I thought I would see how this vegetable oil worked.

Using a deep pot, I filled it about 2-3 inches full of vegetable oil and monitored the temperature with a thermometer that clips onto the side of the pot. From what I read online, you want to maintain 250 - 300 degrees. Keep in mind when you fry a batch (of anything) the temperature will drop, so most often you will need to pause between batches to allow the oil to reach a high temperature again.

Using a mandoline, I sliced the zucchini on the thinest setting. If you watch Hell's Kitchen, then you know how careful you must be when using a mandoline. Keep fingers back and use the attachment that comes with most mandolines that hold the food item for you, keeping thick plastic between your fingers and the blade.

I wasn't sure if these needed to dry out a little, so I placed my first batch of sliced zucchini between two sheets of paper towels to absorb some of the juice.

I didn't do this to any other batches, it really didn't make any difference.

When the oil was hot I dropped a few pieces in and let them fry for about 10-15 seconds.

Using a slotted spoon I carefully pushed them around and flipped, so all sides browned evenly.

As soon as I removed them from the oil, I placed on paper towels and sprinkled with salt.

These are a wonderful treat along side a sandwich at lunch. Best of course eaten right away. I would bet they become soggy if left to sit out...I really wouldn't know since Jim and I gobbled these up as soon as I finished all batches.

Healthy Moroccan Chicken

This is a meal I've been wanting to post about for months because it is different than what I normally cook with exotic flavors and is REALLY healthy.

The recipe for Moroccan Chicken came from an online friend Tricia who found it on the internet somewhere. I usually serve this over rice, but this particular evening I only had egg noodles in the pantry so that is what I made. You will need the following...

Your ingredient list:

1 lb chicken breasts, no skin, no bone, cubed

2 teaspoons salt

1 onion, chopped

2 garlic cloves, chopped

2 carrots, sliced

2 stalks celery, sliced

1 tablespoon fresh ginger root, minced fresh

1/2 teaspoon paprika

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1/4 teaspoon ground turmeric

1 1/2 cups chicken broth

1 cup crushed tomatoes

1 cup chickpeas, drained

1 zucchini, sliced

1 tablespoon lemon juice

I defrosted three chicken breast and rinsed in the sink first.

Slice them horizontally.

Then slice the other direction to get cubed chicken.

Season this with salt and pepper and then brown in a skillet over medium heat until almost cooked through.

Meanwhile, dice an onion.

Chop the celery sticks.

Chop the carrots. You can see the measurements of these veggies is more than what the recipe calls for. These are mixed with lovely seasoning so add as much of these healthy ingredients as you want.

Once chicken has started to brown, remove from the pan and set aside.

Saute the onion, garlic, carrots and celery in the same pan the chicken came from.

Here are the seasonings. I increased the cayenne pepper to 1/2 teaspoon which was WAY too much for me even though I like spicy foods. Stick with the recipe and only add 1/4 teaspoon of cayenne.

Once the veggies are soft, about 10 minutes, add the seasoning.

Stir fry for about one minute.

There are lots of brown bits on the bottom of the pan, and you can see that each piece of vegetable is coated with the spices.

Now add the can of crushed tomatoes.

Add the chicken broth.

This looks really soupy, don't worry it will thicken up.

Return the chicken to the pan, reduce heat to low and simmer for 10 minutes.

This is what mine looks like after 10 minutes.

I sliced my zucchini and drained the can of chickpeas.

Add chickpeas.

Add zucchini.

Stir to combine and bring to simmering once again. Cover pan and cook for about 15 minutes, or until zucchini is cooked through and tender.

The very last step before serving is to stir in 1 tablespoon of lemon juice. This little addition really brightens up the dish.

This is excellent served over rice. Tonight, however, I cooked up egg noodles - Jim's favorite!

A big bowl full of vegetables and some chicken pieces, spiced to perfection (just don't use as much cayenne pepper as I did.)