He made food: chicken with shallots and Dijon

Tonight Mr. ALIQUID offered to make dinner, because he saw this recipe on the New York Times website and wanted to try it. If he wants to cook, I'm certainly not going to say no! Before we even started eating, he asked, "Are you going to blog about this?" I said sure, so here we are!

This is a great easy one-pot dinner: chicken thighs in a white wine and Dijon mustard sauce with shallots, tarragon and cherry or grape tomatoes. It's soooo flavorful, with a nice balance of savory and acidic! Mr. ALIQUID's chicken didn't come out quite as pretty as the picture in the NY Times, but we didn't care. Definitely give this one a try!

I made food: enchiladas

Yay, it's Mexican food time again! It's been a while...I've missed you. Tonight I made enchiladas with homemade sauce. Like so many Mexican dishes, enchiladas are versatile because you can put just about anything you want inside them. As long as you use cheese, of course.

I started by making the sauce (recipe here). It's very easy--basically just tomato paste with seasonings. This sauce has a little heat, but it gets diluted enough once in the enchiladas that it doesn't bother sensitive people like me.

Once the sauce is done, you assemble the enchiladas in a baking dish. I used brown rice, black beans, cheese, and of course the sauce.

 

When you've filled the tortilla, fold over the sides and flip it over--it should stay closed that way. Then spread some more enchilada sauce on top and sprinkle with more cheese. Bake them at 350 for 20-30 minutes, basically until the cheese is melted and the tortillas get a little crispy on the edges. (I've seen some recipes tell you to add more sauce halfway through, and you can do that if you like your enchiladas extra saucy.)

Enchiladas are one of those foods that look kind of gross and yet delicious at the same time, aren't they?

I made food: Mediterranean chicken en papillote

Today I was faced with cooking the dreaded chicken breast, which I normally hate because they tend to be dry and tasteless. My husband suggested trying to cook them en papillote (apparently he heard about it on NPR), which just means you wrap the food in a parchment paper packet so it steams in its own juices.

I followed this recipe from Martha Stewart, except I omitted the artichokes and olives for budgetary reasons.

First you mix up a mustard vinaigrette.

Then in the middle of a piece of parchment paper, you make a little bed of asparagus and top it with a half chicken breast, some vinaigrette, feta, basil and tomatoes.

Then the chickens all go to sleep in their little beds and into the oven...

...and here's what you get when you open the package! (We ate it with penne and homemade marinara.)

Because it cooks all sealed up, the chicken stays moist and tender. It's relatively low-fat (unless you drink all that leftover dressing at the bottom...) And it's very flavorful thanks to the mustard vinaigrette. We both agreed this recipe needs to go into my chicken breast recipe rotation!


Everyone ready for the 31-Day Challenge starting tomorrow? I am!!

I made food: Meatballs and tomato sauce

The other day I made one of my favorite foods, thanks to my sister providing me with her recipe...

(Sorry about the random objects in the background--I haven't really gotten my photography space set up yet. I do have a real camera finally though! With a macro setting and everything! It's a hand-me-down from my dad.)

Turns out meatballs and tomato sauce are incredibly easy to make (not to mention DELICIOUS), and one recipe makes a whole ton of sauce. I hope my sister won't mind if I reproduce her recipe here; it's pretty loose, so you can change it up however you like. (Her notes say "all quantities guesstimated", so really just experiment until you hit on your favorite concoction.)

Ingredients for the meatballs:
1-2 lbs. ground meat of whatever kind(s) you want (I used 1.5 lbs. of beef and got 14 medium-size meatballs)
1 egg
1/2 tbsp. each dried basil and oregano
chili powder to taste, if you want
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. pepper
2 tbsp. grated parmesan (I omitted this because my husband keeps kosher)
1/2 cup breadcrumbs
1/4 cup flour

Ingredients for the sauce:
about 1 cup each of celery, onions, and carrots, chopped
3 cloves of garlic, minced
1 cup red wine
1 box (32 oz.) beef stock
1 can (6 oz.) tomato paste
3 tomatoes, diced (or you can use a large can of tomatoes, like I did)
a bay leaf

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 350 F. Combine all the meatball ingredients in a bowl (use your hands! It's like delicious-smelling Play Doh), then form into balls. In a cast iron skillet or Dutch oven, heat some olive oil on medium heat, and brown the meatballs on all sides (this prevents them from falling apart, as I discovered...). Remove the meatballs and set them aside, and add a little more olive oil. Saute the veggies and garlic until softened.

Put the meatballs back in the skillet, add the wine and increase the heat to high. Let the alcohol boil off for a minute or so. Add the beef stock, tomatoes, tomato paste and bay leaf. Bring everything to a boil and stir to break up the tomato paste, then cover the skillet and put it in the oven for 90 minutes. (I actually left the lid of my Dutch oven slightly ajar to encourage the sauce to reduce.)

If you want the sauce to be smooth, you can take the meatballs out and blend the sauce--I used the immersion blender we got for our wedding. (Just don't blend the bay leaf!) But I've also left the sauce chunky, and that's fine too. Add salt and pepper to taste, and you're done! All you need is some pasta...

Seriously guys, this stuff is so good. Not overly sweet like some tomato sauces, lots of good vegetable flavor, and really moist meatballs!

I'm finally back! (plus a recipe)

Hey there, readers! Did you forget about me? It took us a few weeks, but we've pretty much completed our move to the Boston area, and today we finished unpacking the office so I have my computer back!

It's been a pretty big adjustment moving from a small college town to a huge metropolitan area, but our new apartment is pretty nice and the doggie has a backyard to play in. Oh, and can I just say that Boston traffic is THE WORST. Absolutely nuts. I keep getting honked at because apparently in Boston you're not supposed to wait for a gap in traffic before turning...you're just supposed to GO!

But enough complaining! I had to cut my nails down to stubs since so many of them broke during the move, but I'd like to get polishing again soon! All I wore for the past two weeks was Julep Oxygen Nail Treatment, and I must say it held up pretty well to all the beating it got! Oh, and also in nail news, I got a Helmer at Ikea!

Here's my nail setup. My polish collection occupies five of the drawers in the Helmer, although with a lot of extra room in each drawer for more. Sadly, my lightbox was a victim of the move, so I'll have to make a new one, but that's no problem since we're swimming in cardboard boxes!

Finally, I'll leave you with a good pasta recipe I made up tonight. I didn't manage to take a picture, so you'll just have to imagine...

I cooked some whole wheat penne and set it aside. In a pan I put a healthy amount of olive oil and sauteed some minced garlic; after a minute I added some cherry tomatoes and frozen kale. Once the tomatoes started bursting open I turned off the heat and added salt and pepper, lemon juice and fresh basil. The result tasted really fresh and summery, and had beautiful, vibrant red and green colors!

We're trying to cut costs when it comes to groceries, so it'll be interesting trying to come up with new recipes I can make on a budget!

OK, I'll be making sure to blog regularly again--I've had a language-related post planned for a while now, so I'll try to get that up tomorrow. And if anyone has any suggestions for fun stuff to do in Boston or good restaurants to try, let me know!

I made food: ratatouille

Hey folks! Before I get to the food, you may have noticed that my blog looks a little different! I wrestled with Blogger for a few hours today and ended up with a new banner and buttons. I made those images with PicMonkey. I also got some new social media buttons--this site has a bunch of sets to choose from. Finally, I set up a Facebook page to complement the blog. Give me a like if you want!

OK, on to the good stuff. I have to get back on the wagon after last week, food-wise (mostly thanks to a lot of leftover bridal shower cake!). In my opinion, the easiest way to eat healthy is to cook up a bunch of vegetables with good, hearty flavors--it's more enjoyable than a piece of steamed broccoli, and it can really make you feel satisfied.

So I whipped up a Dutch oven full of ratatouille! I basically followed this recipe, except I omitted the mushrooms (yes, I'm a cretin), used canned tomatoes instead of fresh, added some white wine, and threw some mozzarella on top.

Ohhh yeah. The veggies are nice and soft, and the mozzarella and Parmesan give them just a bit of savoriness. I made some quinoa to add some protein and soak up the juice.

This is a very simple recipe, and you could spice it up any way you like--by adding different herbs, for example, or maybe some lemon juice.

I've got a month and a half before my wedding, so let's hope I can keep eating healthy!