Tag: chicken

Chicken Enchiladas

Easy, easy, easy weeknight dish. And versatile. There is no right way to make enchiladas…don’t want to roll your filling in your tortilla? Go ahead, make layers like lasagna. Change up the ingredients to suit yourself. It’s all good.

Since I make my own chicken stock, I often have leftover (bland) boiled chicken. This is a great dish for using up extra chicken, and the heat can be adjusted to suit your tastes. You can make this red or green — though, in all honesty, I prefer a green salsa. The tanginess of the tomatillo makes my tastebuds happy.

Also, I prefer salsa to pre-made enchilada sauce. For reasons that escape me, the sauces sold by my local store all contain wheat. Weird. Your mileage may vary.

Chicken with Vinegar Sauce

I love chicken. I love vinegar. I love chicken and vinegar together. I love it so much that when I cleaned out my recipe clippings a few weeks ago, I had, in addition to my own recipe, three others from various publications. Clearly I’m not alone in my love of this flavor combination.

This meal packs a lot of flavor and adds a note of elegance to a weeknight or weekend meal. Make sure you plan for leftovers!

As with all my recipes, adjust the proportions to suit your needs, but you probably won’t need to increase the amount of vinegar — one cup is the maximum you’ll need for most meals. And the chicken stock and heavy cream are about right as well…unless you are feeding a small crowd.

If you love garlic (and who doesn’t?), the cloves come out of the pot soft and a bit pickled, so don’t be afraid to add some extra.

Chicken and Andouille Jambalaya

Jambalaya is most strongly associated with Louisiana, though friends from Mississippi claim it as their own. Every person who makes jambalaya has his or her own secret recipe — and, if you spend about five minutes searching for recipes on Google, you will discover dozens of variations of this classic dish.

Put another way: this recipe is just a starting point for your own version of jambalaya. My recipe anticipates you will have plenty of time to cook this dish…but, as you will see, there are plenty of opportunities to speed up the meal if time is short.

There are two major types of jambalaya: Creole, which contains tomato and is often associated with New Orleans, Cajun, which relies upon browned veggies and meat for a wonderful smoky flavor. My recipe blends the best of both styles, featuring chicken, spicy andouille sausage, and, when it’s on sale, shrimp.

Needless to say, jambalaya is a great party dish because the recipe can easily be doubled. It’s also a great dish for crockpots.

Making Chicken Breasts Less Boring

I’m going to be perfectly honest: my least favorite part of a chicken (or turkey) is the breast. Especially when I’m cooking the whole bird. Even with brining, the breast tends to be overcooked. Boneless, skinless breasts aren’t much better.

(Much to my mother’s dismay, I prefer to cook my chicken on the bone. She sometimes wonders if I was switched at birth.)

But chicken breasts are quick and easy — perfect for weeknight meals — and I make them a lot. They’re quick on the grill, in the oven, even pan-roasted. And, with a little bit of effort, it’s easy to elevate the boneless, skinless chicken breast into something fun and tasty.

This is terrific for the gluten-free diner, especially since it sometimes seems we spend way too much time finding and preparing foods. Sometimes, we just want our meals to be easy.
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