Restaurant-style Fried Rice

Ingredients

by Suzan McAllister

2 cups jasmine rice (you can use whatever rice you want, I like jasmine)

4 cups water

2/3 c. chopped baby carrots

1/2 c. frozen peas

2 TBSP vegetable oil (peanut is best)

2 tsp sesame oil

2 eggs

soy sauce to taste (start with a scant quarter cup)

Steps

Cook the rice according to directions

If using fresh carrots, boil them in water for 3-5 minutes to soften them up and drain them. If frozen, skip this step

A wok is best for this recipe, but any heavy skillet will do.

Assemble your ingredients close at hand before starting. Put the pan on high heat and add the oils. Once heated up, back the heat off just a notch or two.

Add the carrots and peas to the pan – stir constantly throughout this process. After about 30 seconds, crack in eggs while quickly scrambling them in the pan with the veggies. Add the rice. Shake in enough soy sauce to lightly color the rice. Don’t be concerned about getting the deep color you see in some restaurants. If you get the rice dark, the whole dish is going to taste like soy sauce and nothing else. Toss to coat.

Add-ins

This is a great way to use up leftovers. Chop up any protein (Chicken, Beef, Pork, Seafood, Tofu) into small bits and toss it in before the rice. If you need to cook your protein, fry it in the oil before adding the vegetables.

Greektalian Chicken Wraps

Suzan McAllister

• 2-3 pieces Greek Flat bread
• 1 small grilled chicken breast, shredded or diced
• 1 chicken asiago sausage
• 1/2 c grated summer squash
• 1 1/2 c “Rainbow Salad”
• 1/2 c Mayonnaise
• 3 TBSP Olive Garden Italian dressing
• Shredded lettuce
• Shredded Parmesan

Heat up the sausage and chicken in a skillet large enough to fit your flat bread. 

Remove to a small plate, add a little olive oil and a TBSP of Italian dressing to the skillet. Sauté the rainbow salad in the dressing for one minute. (Note: Rainbow salad is a mixture of matchstick broccoli, cauliflower and carrots)

Remove from heat and add the summer squash – toss and remove to a small plate.  

Mix the mayonnaise and remaining Italian dressing. Heat up your flat bread in the skillet.

Dress the flat bread with the mayonnaise mixture, sprinkle with Parmesan cheese and shredded lettuce. Next layer on the vegetables and top with meat mixture.

Should make 3, or 2 overstuffed wraps.

Southwest Crispy Chicken Salad

Suzan McAllister

The dressing recipe will generously cover 2 dinner salads.
I’m using prepared crispy chicken strips, so if you’re looking for that recipe, sorry to disappoint.  This is a quick week-night recipe.

Salad Ingredients

Crispy Chicken Strips, cooked according to package directions
(or, if you’re feeling ambitious, make some Southwestern Crispy Chicken Nuggets)
Romaine or artisan mix
3-4 sprigs fresh Cilantro
Red onion
Fresh Corn
Black Beans
Avocado
Tomatoes (small dice)
Grated carrot
Red Bell Pepper
Shredded Cheddar
Tortilla strips

Dressing

4 TBSP mayonnaise
2TBSP sour cream
2 tsp water
1 tsp cider vinegar
1 tsp lime juice
¼ tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp garlic powder
4-5 sprigs fresh minced Cilantro
2 tsp Chili Powder
1 tsp Cumin
Sriracha (optional)

Directions

Get your chicken strips started.  I buy frozen chicken that is raw, so it’s a 40 minute cook time – best to get that going before I start.  If you bought plain Crispy Chicken, season lightly with cumin and chili powder before cooking.
Again, if you’re feeling ambitious, make your own Southwestern Crispy Chicken Nuggets.

Next, prepare the dressing so it can meld while you take care of the produce.
Mix mayo, sour cream, vinegar and lime juice in a small bowl.  Add dry spices (onion powder, garlic powder, chili powder and cumin – tip  – don’t be generous with the onion powder.  It’s risky to use it in a raw preparation because it can give quite an off-putting flavor) and mix.  Mince the Cilantro and mix it in until everything is well incorporated and there are no mayo or sour cream lumps.  A whisk works well for this. Put this in the fridge to let the flavors marry.  Want it a little hotter?  Start with a tsp of Sriracha mixed in.  Taste it.  Keep adding until you have the heat you want.

Wash and drain all produce, drain and rinse the beans.
Thinly slice red onion.  You’ll want about 3-4 slices per salad.
If your corn is raw, nuke it for about 2 minutes and allow it to cool in the refrigerator. If it’s frozen corn, just make sure it’s thawed.
Seed and dice the tomato to about 1/4 inch cubes.
Grate the carrot, you’ll want about 2 TBSP per salad.
Cube the avocado into about 1/2 inch cubes (or a little smaller)
Cut the pepper into thin slices then chop into 1/4 inch chunks.  You’ll want about a quarter of a pepper in each salad.

Layer ingredients in your serving bowl as follows:
Lettuce, onion, carrot, beans, avocado, corn, peppers, tomato, cheese
Cut your chicken into bite size pieces and place it, warm, on top
Top with tortilla strips and garnish with Cilantro

Serve with dressing on the side so your guest can add as desired.

Cosmic Chicken

This is a very involved recipe, and I can’t promise you’ll get the same results I did, but you can try, I promise it will be enjoyable.  The chicken will probably taste the same, but the rest I make no promises about.  This recipe is for adults of drinking age only.

Start out with some raw chicken.  It is my opinion that you should procure this chicken from a poultry farm closeby.  If you have to buy it from a megalamart, so be it. Roll the dice and feed the food monopolies that are trying to shorten our lives so we don’t use up so much health care.

This recipe takes 3 days to complete.

Here’s a (rather lengthy) list of stuff you’ll need:

1 whole chicken, cut up

Marinade:

• Cider Vinegar
• Olive Oil
• Water
• Granulated Garlic
• Your favorite seasoning mix (I used Emeril’s Essence – low salt, you might like Seasoning Salt)
• Roughly cracked peppercorns
• Hungarian Paprika
• Oregano

Cooking Supplies

• Charcoal Grill (and the charcoal, of course)
• Tongs
• Roasting pan
• Old about-to-be-discarded bread pan

Extra-curricular supplies

• Industrial Strength fan
• Garden hose connected to water supply, outfitted with a misting nozzle
• Alcoholic beverage of choice (I used Lemonberry Shandy)
• Turntable and Receiver
• Original LP versions of “The Worst of Jefferson Airplane”; Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young’s “Deja Vu”; Eric Clapton’s “461 Ocean Boulevard”; and Mumford and Son’s “Babel”
• Swim suit
• Waterproof sun block
• Really hot sunny summer day

Two days before cooking:
Mix up some marinade.
Combine 3/4 c cider vinegar and 1/2 c olive oil.  Add seasoning.  Use whatever you want, or follow my list above.  Use A LOT.  I probably threw in nearly a quarter cup of the dry seasonings, each. Whisk the heck out of this to make a solution from the oil and vinegar.  If you only use garlic and pepper, this chicken will be delicious.  Add other herbs and spices as wanted.

Put your raw chicken in a large plastic bag or bowl.  Dump your marinade mixture on top and then cover with water.  Allow to stand in the refrigerator for two days.

Cooking day (must be hot and sunny):

Put on your swim suit. Liberally apply waterproof sun block. Fire up the grill.  You’ll need to maintain the coals at 300 degrees for over an hour.  I covered half of my coal pan in a double layer of coals, then added 4-6 briquets every half hour. I did this so that I could transfer the chicken to the non-coals side to cook after I’d browned it.

Get your chicken and your bread pan.  This pan will be useless to make bread in when you’re done, so choose wisely.  Any smallish pan you can put on the grill will work.

Get the chicken out of the marinade and transfer the marinade to the bread (or other) pan.

Open your first beer, or other alcoholic beverage.  Put the bread pan full of marinade directly over the coals.  This marinade is going to flavor your chicken and keep it moist throughout the cooking process.

Get “The Worst of Jefferson Airplane” going on the record player.  Turn it up.  Dance a little bit.

Once the coals have become fully involved (grey around all edges), bring your beverage, the chicken, tongs, bread pan full of marinade and roaster out to your grill. Set the grill as close to the coals as you can.  Place the chicken on the grill directly over the coals and cook until you have nice grill marks and the skin starts to brown.  While you’re watching that business, finish up your preparations.

Remember vividly that you always knew that EVERYONE in the 60s really only needed to listen to the LAST LINE of “White Rabbit”.

Plug in your fan and bring the hose (with mister) up in front of it.  Point the fan at the area just in front of the grill.  Point the hose nozzle straight into the air in front of the fan. Turn on the fan and the hose. Make sure neither the fan nor the cord are in danger of getting wet.

Turn the record over.

You may be on beer two or three by now.  Drink at your own pace, but make sure you don’t get dry.

When you have a nice sear on the chicken, move it away from the direct heat and move the coal pan down.  Cover the grill.  Tell your phone to set a timer for 40 minutes.  You’ll thank yourself later.

It’s about time to change the record, so put on CSNY Deja Vu.

You should be groovin’ very nicely by now.

Come to the realization that you are enjoying yourself SO MUCH that this must be COSMIC CHICKEN. Do that before the last song on the first side of Deja Vu.

Now you’re just letting the chicken bake on the grill. Keep the grill temp at around 300 degrees and keep it covered.  Check it occasionally to make sure you don’t have any fires that will burn the skin, and keep adding 4-6 coals to keep the temperature up.

The marinade gets really crazy looking.  Don’t worry, it’s normal.

After one of your chicken checks, look around in the grass.

Wow, man….there’s a butterfly.

 

 

Proof that the bombers really did turn into butterflies above our nation, and this IS Cosmic Chicken!

Heavy.

Moderate your drinking so that you don’t fall into the grill.

It will help if you change the record to Eric Clapton’s 461 Ocean Boulevard.  No one sings the Hand Jive like Eric.  Another method of keeping your sobriety in check is to carry on long involved conversations with your adult children using only the largely unusable and hopelessly tiny texty thingy on your phone.  Type your answers without the aid of your glasses, then put them on to check them before you hit send.  It’s entertaining. Make sure you tell them how cool the music was in the 60s.

Suddenly remember that you’re standing in man-made rain, and you’re cool with that, even though your glasses are currently unusable.

Put on Mumford and Sons so you can return to the 21st century.

Don’t be frightened when your phone timer goes off.  Remember that you initialized that action.  The man is not out to get you.

Time to finish up that beautiful chicken skin.  Move the chicken back to directly over the coals.  Keep it there until it’s got some bad-looking skin, flip it over and do the same for the other side.

When the internal chicken temperature is over 160 degrees, it’s time to take the chicken off the grill and bring it in the house.

Watch out for the hose.

Set the chicken on the kitchen counter until you’re done listening to Mumfy and your beer is gone.  Just the one you’re drinking.  You don’t have to stay outside until the fridge is empty. Marvel at the wonder of the cosmos that your energy has infused into this chicken.

Come on back in and serve yourself up some dinner!

I recommend having made some pasta salads early in the day.

Have a groovy evening.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Beer Butt Chicken

Suzan McAllister
Prep time: 15 mins
Cook time: 1 hour 15 mins

Ingredients

4-5 lb whole roasting chicken
1 can of beer
1 clove garlic
Seasoning Salt

Tools
Roasting pan
Knife
Paper towel
Glass
Long rod
Tongs

Notes about ingredients:
Any chicken will do, but there are special chickens that the butchers say are good for roasting, and you can buy one of these if you like.
Recently I have replaced Seasoning Salt with Emeril’s Essence, but I made it with seasoning salt for years, so I listed that, lest my children become wary that I have once again duped them.

Prep:
Preheat oven to 350.
Cut off the top of the beer can with a can opener.
If you’re somewhere where you don’t have one, you can just open the beer, but it’s better if you cut the top off.
Pour half the beer into a glass.
Drink it.
Dump about 2-3 tbsp of seasoning salt into the beer can.
Smash up your garlic clove, remove the skin and throw the clove in the beer can.

Position the beer can in the middle of the roaster.

Remove any material from the chicken’s cavity (kidneys, giblets, excess fat)
Stick your hand up in there to spread him out.
Once you’ve got the meat evenly distributed so he’ll balance, grab him so that you’ve got a grip on the drumsticks with your thumbs, and with your fingers spread open the cavity.
Gently shove the chicken down over the top of the can.
You may have to pick up chicken and can simultaneously to properly position the can in the chicken so he’ll balance.
Don’t be afraid.  The worst that will happen is you’ll have chicken on the floor and have to open another beer…and drink half of it again.
You can rinse off the chicken.  Just make sure no one’s watching.
Pin back the wings.  To do this, fold the tip of the wing back behind the shoulder.  This lets Mr. Chicken have a good repose position to get ready for his tanning session.
Dry off the entire outside of the chicken with 3-4 paper towels.
Pat down the entire outside of him with seasoning salt.
Pretend it’s sunscreen – cover him up good.

Make sure your oven racks are positioned so you can get him in.
Open the oven, then carefully place the roaster in the oven.

Bake at 350 for 1 hour 15 mins
Take him out of the oven and let him rest for 10 minutes.  Roasting is hard work.

Getting him off the can is sometimes quite entertaining.
Remember, he’s just a drunk sitting on the can.
You can just carve him while he’s still on there, but I’ve found that the beer and can can get quite hot, and any mishap can result in burning my skin, so I get rid of the can before I cut him up.
I take the honing blade for my knives and stick it through the hole at the top of the chicken, until it hits the bottom of the can.
Next I use tongs to extract the chicken upward and break him free from the can.

Cut into 8’s (2 wings, 2 thighs, 2 breasts, 2 drumsticks) and serve.

Enjoy!

Ruby Glazed Chicken Breasts

1/3 c apple juice
3 tbsp currant jelly
1 tsp cornstarch
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 tsp dried marjoram, crushed
6 chicken breasts (about 2 1/4 lbs, total)

Sauce:
In a small saucepan, combine apple juice, jelly, cornstarch and salt.

Cook until mixture boils, then cook and stir 2 more minutes. Stir in marjoram

Skin chicken. Grill chicken, bone side up on an uncovered grill directly over medium coals for 15 minutes. Turn Chicken and brush with sauce. Grill for 20 to 30 minutes more or until chicken is tender and no longer pink.

Brush with additional sauce before serving

6 Servings

My teenagers whipped this up for us one night. It was scrumptious.

Chicken Marsala

Tony Boland

4 boneless chicken breasts
3/4 c Marsala Wine
3/4 c chicken stock
Flour
Garlic
Italian herbs
1 c mushrooms, sliced
1/3 c butter
Salt & Pepper
Olive Oil
Asparagus
Mashed Potatoes

Slice chicken breasts into halves or thirs then, if desired, pound chicken slices thinner.  Lightly coat chicken with mixture of flour and seasonings (garlic//pepper/salt/Italian herbs). Brown chicken on both sides in a pan with a little olive oil. Remove chicken to a plate, cover with tin foil and let rest.

Fry sliced mushrooms in the pan, with some butter (bellas are best). Add Marsala Wine, let reduce by about half. Then add 3/4 c of chicken stock, let come back to a simmer.

Add chicken back to win/stock/mushrooms. Let sauce reduce while finishing the cooking of the chicken till it starts to thicken, then add a stick of butter. Chicken is done when butter is melted and chicken is coated in sauce.

Best served wtih baked asparagus, just roll asparagus with olive oil, salt and papper, then bake, and potatoes (mash ’em, bake ’em, whatever)

P Mac’s Quesadillas

Price McAllister

1/2 Green Pepper
1/2 Onion
1/2 TBSP butter
1 can black beans
Tortillas
Sour Cream
Cheese
Chicken (boneless skinless breasts)

Season the chicken with garlic salt, onion powder, cumin, season salt and pepper to taste.  2 breasts is usually enough for 2 people, so plan accordingly.

Start the chicken cooking in a skillet with some olive oil to keep it from burning. At the same time, add the butter and the green pepper and onion into a separate pan. Sweat the peppers and onions until they are tender enough to break with minimal effort.

The chicken should be just about finished. Once it is done, separate it using two forks in teh pan. Once the chicken is separated, warm a tortilla on a griddle until it is soft. Place the ingredients on one half of the tortilla in this order: Cheese, chicken, peppers+onions, beans, more cheese.  Fold the tortilla in half.

Spray a griddle with Pam or grease it with butter. If you have a panini grill, then spray the upper and lower portions of the grill. Put the quesadilla on the grill or griddle and either shut the lid or put something heavy on it, preferably something that can take a little heat (an old plate works well). If you have to use the plate method, flip the quesadilla once the cheese starts to melt and the tortilla is a little crispy.  Done-zo.

Sweet Chili Chicken Pizza

Connor McKee


1 pkg pre-made pizza crusts
1 bottle sweet chili sauce
1 pkg mozzarella cheese
1 red pepper
1 green pepper
1 onion
1 chicken breasts

Cook chicken breasts by desired method (George Foreman, etc)

While chicken is cooking, spread a thin layer of sweet chili sauce onto the pizza crust. Now, preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

While chicken is still cooking, chop up red and green peppers as well as the onion. Next, chop up cooked chicken and spread the chicken along with the peppers and onion evenly throughout pizza.

Evenly spread cheese over the top of pizza to desired level of cheesiness.

Cook for 7.529 minutes.  Enjoy!

Ground Turkey Parmesan

Suzi McAllister

1 lb. Ground Turkey
1/2 c grated parmesan, plus some for topping
1/2 c Italian Bread Crumbs
1 TBSP fresh basil
1/2 c shredded mozzarella
1/2 c tomato basil sauce
EVOO

Mix Ground Turkey, 1/4 c each of bread crumbs and parmesan, and basil.  Make 2-4 patties.
Heat your pan to medium heat with 2 turns of EVOO in it.
Put the rest of the bread crumbs and cheese on a plate and mix.
Dredge the patties in the bread and cheese mixture and fry gently until done.  Cooking time will vary depending on how large you made the patties.
Preheat your broiler while the patties are cooking.

When done, remove from heat and put on an oven proof plate or broiler pan.
Top each patty with an appropriate portion of tomato sauce, then divide up the mozzerella to top the tomato sauce.  Sprinkle generously with parmesan cheese.

Place the patties on the ovenproof plate or broiler pan, and put under the broiler for 2-3 minutes, until cheese is bubbly and golden brown.

Great with Tomato Florentine Fettucine