Braised Chicken in Arugula Cream

So my hubby has one of his late nights at work today so it's just me and the baby for dinner. I had a whole chicken that needed to be used up ASAP so I found this great recipe: Braised Chicken in Arugula Cream

From the title, I was worried that it might be a bit labor intensive - which is tough when I only have two hands and the baby usually has dibs on them. Thankfully, it's a pretty easy recipe (and the baby went down for a nap, hooray!).

Use skin on, bone in chicken thighs, drumsticks and breasts. Pre-heat the oven to 425. Heat an oven safe skillet or dutch oven on the stove top with a little bit of olive oil.

Sear the chicken in batches, skin side down. Place them on a plate once they're browned.

Drain the fat from the skillet and add in two cloves of minced garlic and a shallot. Saute for about 30 seconds until fragrant.

Add one cup of chicken broth and put the thighs and drumsticks back into the skillet and place in the oven for 20 minutes.

After the 20 minutes are up, add one cup of cream and the chicken breasts and return to the oven for 15 more minutes.

Check to make sure the chicken is cooked through and transfer to a plate.

Put the skillet with the remaining liquid back onto the stove top and reduce until you have about one cup left.

Put the liquid in a food processor and add one bunch of arugula, roughly chopped. Puree until smooth. You can add 2 tablespoons of butter if you like.

Season the sauce with salt and pepper and serve over the braised chicken.

Pair with rice, boiled potatoes or white beans and shallots.

Give it a try and tell me what you think!

Braised Short Ribs Beef Stew

I love Alton Brown's program Good Eats. Recently I watched an episode and he made some beef stew and it looked so good I had to try it myself.  I mean, just look at this? Doesn't it make your mouth water?

So let's get down to business.

You can find the original recipe here

Ingredients:

1/4 cup tomato paste
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
1 1/2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
1 tablespoon paprika
1 1/2 teaspoons dried herbs, any combination of thyme, oregano and rosemary
3 pounds English-cut short ribs
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon kosher salt, divided
1 large yellow onion, thinly sliced
1 pound red potatoes, unpeeled and diced small
Freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley leaves

Gather the first 5 items. I was out of tomato paste so I used some diced tomatoes in their juices. 

Mix everything together in a bowl and set aside.

Pat dry your short ribs and salt them well. 

Sear the short ribs on a hot griddle and brown each side.

Make sure you get a nice deep brown - this is the only browning the meat will get during it's cooking time.

Add the meat to the marinade and then place everything onto a sheet of tin foil and seal up the edges.

Place in a cold oven with a pan underneath to catch any spill over. Now preheat the oven to 250 and set the timer for 4 hours.

Tick...Tock...Tick...Tock...

Ding!

Look how the meat turns out! Tender, shreds easily with a fork and melts in your mouth.

As an aside, the meat turns out like this because the original piece had a lot of connective tissue called collagen. Cooking low and slow causes the collagen to break down into gelatin, turning a relatively tough piece of meat into the sumptuous morsel you see in front of you.

Pour the juices into a glass and refrigerate to separate the fat.

Fast forward to day two.

Put one tablespoon of the separated beef fat into a pan to roast the vegetables in. You can keep the rest of the fat in the fridge to use in cooking later in the week.

Saute mirpoix in the beef fat and add the diced red potatoes.

Add the remaining beef juices.

Cover and simmer on low for 30 minutes until the potatoes soften.

Add the short ribs and warm through for another 10 minutes.

Enjoy!

Braised Organic Lamb & Beans

Oh, to eat organic, grass fed meat! It's amazing how you can really taste the difference from the normal, everyday variety. Unfortunately, with the way my husband can pack away the food (and if I had his routine of 5am gym time and 10+ hour work days I would too!), eating organic meat is cost prohibitive. I can only imagine how much I'll spend on groceries when our little guy is running around and eating full meals like his daddy...

Anyways, as the savvy shopper that I am, I've discovered that our local Wegmans tends to discount their meat selection on Wednesdays (as it nears the sell by date cutoff) so I'll pop over there every other week and check out the goodies. As long as you either eat the meat that evening or freeze it right away, you're good. I've amassed quite a selection of delicious organic fare this way. Another trick to discounted food if your grocery store doesn't have a set discount day is to check out the sell by dates of the food you're interested in and return to the store the day before it's set to expire. I did this with organic leg of lamb. There were a bunch of them, and what were the odds of all those legs being bought up when we weren't near a holiday? I came back a few days later and, sure enough, they were all marked down 50%. Woohoo!

I scored this butterflied leg of lamb for half off and found a tasty recipe from Wegmans for Braised Organic Lamb & Beans from which I've adapted this recipe.

Ingredients

• 2.5 - 3lbs lamb
• pan searing flour
• olive oil
• 8 oz. Mirepoix (diced carrots, celery and onions)
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 cup white wine
• 28 oz. cut tomatoes with basil
• 3 x 15.5 oz. cans cannellini beans, drained
• 1 lemon, zested and juiced
• 1 cup chicken stock
• fresh rosemary
• fresh thyme
• salt and pepper

Preheat your oven to 350F. Put a dutch oven on medium high on the stove top.

Dust your lamb with some pan searing flour. If you'll recall from my previous post, the flour will help dry off the meat and allow it to sear beautifully.

Now that your dutch oven is nice and warm, pour in a couple glugs of extra virgin olive oil and sear your meat.

It should only take a couple minutes per side.

After your lamb has seared, set it aside on a plate and gather your other items.

Add your mirepoix and bayleaf to the dutch oven you were using for your lamb.

Pour two cups of wine, one for the recipe and the other to drink while you cook :)

And while you're taking that little break to enjoy the fruits of a vineyard's labor, check out a sneaky little tip about cooking with wine here.

Ok, back to cooking. Pour in the cup of wine and lemon juice and deglaze the pan. That means the wine will pick up all those little browned bits of lamb and caramelized veggies. Cook the wine down for 5-10 minutes until the liquid has reduced by half. Doing this allows evaporation, leaving more flavor in the resulting liquid.

Now you can add the remaining ingredients - beans, tomatoes, and lemon zest (you did check out my nifty trick for lemon zest earlier, right?)

Now pop the lamb on top of that wonderful braising mixture you've just concocted and douse it with a cup of chicken broth.

Ah, beautiful! Bring up the heat a bit so it starts simmering (see those little bubbles forming on the surface?)

Now place it in your toasty oven and let it work it's magic for about 2 to 2.5 hours. You want the meat to pull apart when you stick a fork in it. When you're satisfied with the tenderness, mix in the rosemary, thyme and season with salt and pepper to taste.

Just look at that!

Gorgeous!