Chicken and Peach Teriyaki Skewers

I have two confessions to make.
One: I like low prices.
Two: I love salty-sweet foods.
Like chocolate-covered pretzels.
Or that salted caramel mocha that Starbucks used to serve.
Or salt on my watermelon. Or peach. Or nectarine. Or any other sweet fruit.

So, when peaches were on sale at my grocery store, I got a whole bunch. However, these cheap peaches were also very hard and not ripe, altogether lacking in the qualities that make peaches good for snacking on, in my opinion. So, they were the perfect peaches to experiment with the savory applications of peaches.

Enter: these teriyaki skewers. The sweeter flavors of peaches and honey and ginger combine quite nicely with the salty-savory of chicken and soy sauce. In my humble opinion.

I marinated a pound of chicken in homemade honey-teriyaki sauce for about half an hour. I would recommend marinating them longer, but I was hungry. And I'm an impatient person. Who doesn't plan ahead. So they only marinated half an hour.

Then I sliced up three peaches and tossed them with sesame oil and balsamic vinegar.

I threaded the skewers, alternating chicken and peaches, and then "grilled" them in an iron skillet. I have found that an iron skillet on my stove makes a decent substitute for a grill. But if you have a grill, hey, go outside and grill them!

They were a great summer meal, and came together pretty quickly.
Or at least, they would have if I had not been taking pictures the whole way through.
That's how a lot of my cooking goes, though.
Oh well.

Chicken-Peach Teriyaki Skewers (print recipe)

1 pound boneless chicken

1/4 c soy sauce
1/2 tsp worcestershire sauce
1tsp fresh pounded ginger
2 Tbs honey

3 peaches
1Tbs sesame oil
1Tbs balsamic vinegar

Mix soy sauce, worcestershire sauce, ginger, and honey in bowl and marinate chicken for at least half an hour.
Slice peaches into 8ths and toss in sesame oil and vinegar.
Thread skewers, alternating chicken and peaches.
Grill until chicken is done (about 10-20 minutes).

Oven Fried Chicken

It is summer. I mean, really, it's summer. It's really hard to miss here in Oklahoma. The first clue is the stifling heat and humidity that wraps you up like a big, warm, wet blanket and doesn't let go for a few months.

Nevertheless, I continue to maintain that I would rather be hot than cold. Hot is not fun, I will admit that, it is miserable and stifling and sometimes feel like I am boiling alive and like I cannot think because my brain cells are slowly being cooked one by one....

That is my nephew. He looks like he thinks it's too hot.

But I still think cold is worse. I know how to cool off. Granted, I think Oklahoma is hotter than the tropics in the summertime but many of my tried and true techniques perfected over ten years of living on a tropical island still work to at least take the edge off the heat here. But cold... I don't know how to deal with cold. When I'm cold I just freeze up into a little miserable tense ball of cold. I can't get warm, I can't move, it hurts to be cold.

Besides. I love cotton. I really, really, really love loose cotton yoga pants. They are one of my favorite things ever. And it is really hard to rock loose cotton yoga pants when there is snow on the ground. They are much more suited to stifling summer days. But, as the name of this post is "oven fried chicken" and not "loose cotton yoga pants," I digress. Maybe I will write another blog about loose cotton yoga pants. They deserve their own blog post. I'll get back to the point now.

Hot summer days call for picnics and swimming in the cool lake and ice cream (like this)

and lady bugs (like this)

and iced tea and cold fried chicken and watermelon. Cold fried chicken is, in my opinion, the perfect picnic food. You can make it the day before, it is cold and delicious, and just screams SUMMER PICNIC to me. You almost have to eat it while sitting on a red and white checkered tablecloth on the grass.

I guess, however, not everyone has had the privilege of eating cold fried chicken on purpose rather than just because they were too lazy to heat up the leftover fried chicken. When I first proposed the idea as part of a picnic menu, Morgan looked at me like I was a bit crazy. But he now admits that it is alright, and an acceptable picnic item. Mostly because I made him admit it whether he wanted to or not. I digress again.

The only problem with fried chicken on the summer picnic menu is the standing over the hot, popping oil frying chicken for hours and hours. (because it sure seems to take fried chicken hours and hours to cook. Or is that just me?) And hot, popping oil isn't my favorite thing on the best of days. I'm kind of scared of it. It always targets my face. I end up with little red blister bumps all over my arms, kind of greasy, hot, tired, and mad at the world. This is not a good way to start a picnic day, so I propose an alternative to this method of frying chicken: oven fried chicken.

Obviously, oven fried chicken is not actually FRIED chicken, per se, since it is not fried, but it is still crunchy and happy and fully ok for picnics. So I shall show you how to make it, now that I have talked for a sufficiently long time to probably put you to sleep.

The main ingredient in oven fried chicken (besides the chicken), the secret weapon of crunchiness, as shown to me by my mommy, is CORN FLAKES. Crunchy crispy corn flakes make our chicken all crispy and fried-like.

You take the corn flakes and crunch them up into little pieces with your hands. It's fun. Then you add flour and spices to make it a proper covering for chicken.

My favorite spices in this recipe are seasoned salt, pepper, and garlic powder. Lots of each, for maximum flavor impact.

Now in another bowl we mix eggs and milk for a wash to get the crunchy to stick to the chicken. 

Dip each drumstick (or thigh, it works well on thighs too) into the egg-milk mixture.

Then coat it well in the crunchy mixture.

And lay them out on a baking tray. You want the tray to have sides, and if possible it would be best to put the chicken up on a rack on the tray for maximum crunchiness. I didn't have a rack that fit my tray. But we survived anyways.

Bake these delicious noms until the chicken is cooked through. You can tell that chicken is cooked through if, when you stick it with a knife, clear juice runs out. No juice, and it is not cooked enough. Red juice, and it is not cooked enough. Clear juice, and it is cooked enough. Make sure to stick it deep though, and near the bone, to check in the middle of the chicken. It takes about 45 minutes for drumsticks to bake well in my oven.

The result is crunchy deliciousness, without standing over evil popping oil!

Sherman thought the drumsticks looked like something he should help eat. But he was not given a drumstick. I think I offended him. Oh well. He will get over it.

Oven Fried Chicken Recipe:

Dip:
2 eggs
3/4 c milk

Crunch:
1 c crushed corn flakes
1/4 c flour
garlic powder
seasoned salt
pepper

To Do:
Preheat oven to 350 F. 
Beat eggs and milk together in one bowl.
In another bowl, mix the dry ingredients. Season to taste... I use a lot of seasoning, it depends on what you like.
Dip the chicken first in the wet, then in the dry ingredients, coating thoroughly.

Alternatively for a thicker coating, mix the flour and seasonings separately from the crushed corn flakes, and dip the chicken in the flour, then the egg mixture, then the corn flakes. 

Bake chicken for about 45 minutes for drumsticks, or until juice runs clear and chicken is cooked thoroughly. Enjoy hot or cold!

Curry Chicken

As most of you know, I spent a fair portion of my childhood in an Indian community in Fiji. Now, what you may not know, is that from these Indian people comes pretty much the best food in the entire world.
Curry really should be its own food group. The one at the bottom of the pyramid, that you need the most of.
Also, I must warn you that the "curry" I grew up with and am giving you the recipe for here is very, very different from "curry chicken" that is made here in the States, which has a creamy sauce and is served with raisins and coconut and that stuff. That curry much more closely resembles curries from the more upper-class food of India, using cream or yoghurt. It is quite delicious itself, but it is not the curry I grew up eating, and which I make at home.

This particular recipe I got from a friend from Fiji, who is now living in the States.
While it does not take too many "exotic" spices, it does call for a few. I'm not sure if Walmart carries this stuff... I get them from my local Indian grocery store. Probably a spice store or an herb store might carry them? I'm not sure...

Ingredients
About 2-3 pounds of chicken, cubed
 1 chopped onion
2 curry leaves
2 cinnamon sticks, or about a teaspoon of cinnamon
chili powder to taste (depending on how hot you like your food)
salt to taste
1 tsp tumeric
2 tsp curry powder
4 tsp meat masala
cooking oil
cilantro (optional... I don't usually have it on hand, so I don't usually put it in)
thumb-sized piece of ginger (best if fresh, but you can used 1/4 tsp powdered)
8-10 cloves of garlic (yes, that much)
serrano peppers (also to taste, depending on how hot you like your food. I actually usually just omit them)
1 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp mustard seed


Method:
Crush together ginger, garlic, peppers, cumin, and mustard seed.
Heat just enough oil to cover the bottom of your pot.
Add onion and curry leaves, and brown.  
Add crushed spices, and brown.
Add all the rest of the spices and the cinnamon sticks, keep stirring so this does not burn. You will have a spicy, yummy smelling paste.
Add chicken and salt. Stir to just cook the outside of the chicken, then add enough water to cover the chicken about 3/4 the way.
Cover with a lid and cook on low to medium, checking on it and stirring occasionally until done. The chicken will be done and the liquid will have cooked down to about half of what it was.
Taste and add salt if needed. 
Add cilantro and let cook just a little.
Turn off heat and serve with rice, roti, and chutney.
(If you like. Or just eat it with a spoon, from the pan. I might have done that before.)  

Roti is the flat bread, somewhat similar to a tortilla, that is normally eaten with curry. You actually can use the roti instead of silverware to eat the curry (it tastes better that way, promise). You tear off a little piece of roti and use it to pick up your curry and rice. How do you make roti, you might ask? Well, it's very simple, here let me help you:

In a large bowl, mix flour and a little bit of salt. I also add some garlic powder, just for extra flavour and because I like garlic. Add boiling (or very very hot) water, enough to make a somewhat stiff dough, and stir together. Knead for a very, very long time until it is soft and elastic. Pinch off small balls of dough and roll out with flour to keep them from sticking to the counter. You want basically the size and shape of a tortilla.
Heat a non-stick pan to medium heat, and put a roti on it. (I cook them without oil, I find they cook better that way for me.) Cook until both sides are done (some brown spots, but not burnt). I usually flip them three times, that seems to work well. They should puff up as they cook. Pop them and squish the bubbles, or they can get kind of crispy, which is not what we are going for. When the roti is done, place it in a pan and brush some melted butter on it. I put some garlic in the butter, too. Brush melted butter on each roti as they come off the pan. This keeps them soft and yummy. And buttery.

There you go!
This is pretty much about my favorite meal of all time, and I am giving you the recipe.
I know, I'm awesome.  
Thanks.

Sesame Chicken Noms!

I really love Chinese food.
A lot.
I could eat Chinese food and Indian food every day for the rest of my life.
For real.
And one of my favorite Chinese food dishes ever is sesame chicken.
I made sesame chicken for dinner.
It was really, really good and I ate a lot of it.
Lots and lots.
I know, I shouldn't sing my own praises and all that, but it was really good.
Really.
It made me forget that I am trying to lose weight and all that. 
You should make it too.
Right now.
Go ahead.
Here, I'll even give you a recipe. I looked up online a recipe for sesame chicken and then I kind of adapted it a lot until it looks a little like the original, but not much. So, I'll give you mine because it is good and worth eating.

Recipe: 

Ingredients: 
2 pounds of cubed chicken
1/4 c toasted sesame seeds (toast till light brown in a pan on the stove)
vegetable oil for deep frying

Batter:
4 Tbsp soy sauce
4 Tbsp flour
4 Tbsp cornstarch
4 Tbsp water
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp vegetable oil

Sauce:
1/2 c water
1 c chicken broth
1/8 c vinegar
2 Tbsp cornstarch
1 c sugar
2 Tbsp soy sauce
1 tsp chili soy sauce (or chili sauce)
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tsp sesame seeds

Method:
Mix ingredients for marinade and pour over the cubed chicken. Mix together and let this sit while you put together the sauce.

Mix together the ingredients for the sauce in a small sauce pan and bring to a boil over medium to high heat while stirring occasionally with a whisk. Let sauce thicken to syrup consistency, then set heat to very low while you fry the chicken.

Heat enough oil to deep fry chicken in a deep pan. I used my wok. Test the oil by dropping a little of the batter into it. When it sizzles a whole lot, the oil is hot enough. Drop the pieces of chicken into the oil little at a time, separating them as you drop them. Keep stirring, or they will stick to the bottom of the pan... or is that just me? When they are done (light brown, crispy) pull them out and put them in a bowl lined with paper towels to drain.

When the chicken is all fried, heat the sauce up to boiling again. Mix the fried chicken and the sauce in a bowl, then toss with all but a spoonful of the sesame seeds. Sprinkle the last few seeds over the top.

Serve with rice. Or with spaghetti noodles if you want to... personally, I recommend the rice.

Morgan approved of this sesame chicken. Or at least, I think he did, since he ate about three bowls worth.

 

Oh yeah, and I think you should eat this with chopsticks. Because I think all Chinese food should be eaten with chopsticks, with the exception, perhaps, of eggdrop soup. It just tastes better with chopsticks. Trust me. Now go make sesame chicken.