The Funky Kitchen

What a week! I’ve been making long commutes in blizzards (I’m very ready for the snow to melt, by the way), getting invitations printed, finalizing guest lists, attempting valiantly to get my house clean for a party on Saturday, meeting with bridesmaids, finishing baby quilts in time for showers or being sent away… needless to say, it has been intense.

Oh! And my birthday is Saturday! This explains the party preparations. I need to bake a cake! I’ll add it to my to do list.

When you have weeks like these, and we all have them, what really keeps me grounded is still being able to put together a half decent meal when I can squeeze one in edgewise. It’s important to remember to eat, which is a bad habit I fall into when things get hectic, but I’m working on it.

Taking the ten minutes to make a simple but fabulous meal is meditation time for me. Instead of “I need to buy food for this party” or, “I still haven’t printed out that list,”  or “Who hasn’t picked up their dress yet?” you take a few minutes to stir, simmer and have your mental noise be quieted.

And then, best part, you get to eat!

Udon Noodle Chicken Soup

2 Cups Chicken stock

2 Cups water

1 1/2 Tbsp miso paste

1 chicken breast

1 tsp vegetable oil

400 g udon noodles (that’s two packages in the size that I buy them)

1 Cup snow peas

Directions

• Stir the chicken stock, water and miso paste together in a pot over high heat and bring the broth to a boil. 
• Reduce the heat to a simmer, and then tumble in the udon noodles. Being fresh noodles, they really only need a few minutes to be cooked through.
• Put the chicken breast between two layers of wax paper (or a plastic bag), and pound out to about 1/2 inch thickness. This way the chicken will grill up nice and quickly.
• Brush the chicken with the oil, and cook on a hot grill (or grill pan) until the juices run clear, about 1 minute per side.
• Toss the snowpeas into the pot with the udon noodles while the chicken is grilling, again only until they are warmed through and their greenness brightens. They shouldn’t be cooked soft.
• Ladle the soup into bowls and garnish with slices of the grilled chicken.

A batch of this fed Mr and I with a little left over for the next day’s lunch; if your family is bigger or you are dining alone, it’s pretty easy to scale up or down.

Supper is 10 minutes and only a stir, hammer and flip away. It’s almost as low intensity as tossing something frozen into the oven, but you actually get to cook something.

The first time I made this there was less water mixed in, and Mr and I both found it quite salty. This dilute version was more pleasing to us, but if you really want you could cut out some of the water.

I really love the size and toothsome quality of udon noodles, they are just so fun to eat! A supper with these lovely noodles, savory broth to sip, chicken simply cooked so it takes up it’s flavor from the broth, and bright green crunch from snow peas all in under ten minutes is a winner in my books!

This time last year: Pear Ginger Jam

And the year before: French Bread

And the year before that: My First Post!

Did you ever count down the sleeps until Christmas? Or summer vacation?

Being somewhat numerically minded, I have a habit of counting down to things. When Mr goes away with this work, army or otherwise, I count down the days until he can come home again. I count down to Christmas, to trips, to when papers are due because it keeps you mindful of deadlines, and as things get closer excitement mounts.

Mr’s birthday is in 13 sleeps. I need to plan a party. Eep!

I’ve been counting down the days to the wedding (139, for those of you counting with me) and that certainly keeps me ticking things off of the list of things to get done and organized before that day. On one hand as the number gets smaller I get a little more worried that it’s a big deadline to meet, but on the other hand it feels like May 16th all over again and I hop up and down because it’s so exciting.

Yeah, I hop when I’m excited. It’s not that weird, right?

Only 139 more sleeps left means we’re two thirds of the way through being engaged. Time travels so fluidly. Counting down day to day makes it feel slow, gradual, but looking back and remembering that when this countdown started there was just over a year to go makes it feel as though it is going by too quickly.

Is this a habit I should have grown out of some time ago, counting down the sleeps?

I wonder.

Chicken Saltimbocca

4 chicken breasts

3 oz harvarti cheese, cut into 4 sticks

black pepper

12 fresh sage leaves

4 slices of proscuitto

1 tsp olive oil

Directions

• Preheat the oven to 400°F.
• Cut a slit in each chicken breast and stuff each with one of the sticks of harvarti.
• Season the surfaces of the chicken breasts with some black pepper.
• Lay three sage leaves across the top of each, and then wrap with a slice of prosciutto. The prosciutto will hold the sage in place. If you’d like the extra reassurance, you can affix the prosciutto with toothpicks.

• Set a pan over medium high heat, and saute the chicken bundles in the olive oil, turning so that the prosciutto browns on all sides, and then transfer to the oven to finish cooking. (Chicken is cooked when the juices run clear and the internal temperature is 165°F).
• Remove from the oven and let rest a few minutes before serving.

Saltimbocca means “jumps in the mouth” in Italian, and with prosciutto, harvarti, and sage how can it not? What I really love is the way that the prosciutto goes translucent and you can see the sage leaves. This is such a pretty main that goes well with a light, simple pasta dish, or a gorgeous crunchy salad.

Mr says: I could eat a lot of these.

This time last year: Petite Poutine

And the year before: Eggnog Ice Cream

I really do wish that paste was not the word to use for this. Paste just isn’t an attractive word, and it really does not do justice to the complex wonder of an elixir it is. But alas, it is a paste. That’s what it is, even though it is not nearly romantic enough for its usage. Paste may not be very alluring, but this chicken is.

Chiles, coriander, cumin, caraway, garlic and pepper are ground together in a mortar and pestle into an aromatic earthy powder, transformed into a paste by way of a splash of olive oil. They mingle together as friends that don’t often spend time together in my kitchen, but I do believe I will be rectifying that. It’s such an interesting pleasant combination of flavors. Although paste is not an overly attractive word to use, it is the vehicle that transports all of that flavor to the chicken best.

We did these chicken thighs in the oven, but I am yearning to get the barbecue put together so we can try them out on the grill.

Chicken Thighs with North African Spice Paste

(recipe adapted from Gourmet magazine)

2 – 2 inch long dried red chiles

1 Tbsp dried hot pepper flakes

1 Tbsp ground coriander seeds

½ Tbsp ground cumin

½ Tbsp caraway

1 Tbsp garlic powder

1 Tbsp black peppercorns

2 tsp kosher salt

5 Tbsp olive oil

6 chicken thighs, bone in and skin on

• Brown the chicken thighs on both sides in a screaming hot pan to render some fat and crisp the skin.
• Use your mortar and pestle to grind the spices finely. This works best if you work in small batches. A coffee grinder makes quick work of this process as well.
• Add the olive oil to the spice mixture to create a paste.
• Rub over all sides of the browned chicken.
• Place the chicken in an oven safe roasting dish and pop it into a 350 oven. Roast until the chicken is cooked through and the juices run clear (~1 ¼ hours).
• Serve immediately after taking it out of the oven.

For those who may not be so receptive to the spicy edge of the intense North African flavors in the spice paste, this dish pairs really well with a cooling and ameliorating tzadsiki sauce. Lucky, it’s a pretty easy to whip up while the chicken is baking.

Mister, who is not always the biggest fan of spicy food, enjoyed the seasoning because the spice was very present but not incendiary. He especially enjoyed the tzadsiki sauce and remaining spice paste that got left in the pan atop his potatoes.