Chicken in Milk

Years ago, when Mr Minx and I were regular Food Network watchers, we saw an episode of Jamie Oliver's show (The Naked Chef, I believe) in which he oven-braised a whole chicken in a pot of milk. Seemed a little weird, especially as he also added lemon peel, which curdled the milk. Jamie insisted the chicken was the best thing ever, so I filed the idea away in my head to make sometime in the future.

Flash forward a good 15 years when I stumble upon the recipe on the Internet. "Oh yeah," I think, "I was going to make this at some point." Better late than never is definitely true in this case.

I had to adapt the recipe somewhat. I don't have an oven-safe vessel that would comfortably hold a whole chicken, so I used the stovetop. Small chickens are nigh impossible to find in a regular supermarket, and if you know me, you'll know I'm not the kind of person who will go running around from store to store to find a perfect ingredient. Chicken thighs and chicken legs were more than good enough for the job, however, The recipe called for 10 cloves of garlic, skin-on, but my small bulb yielded 14 and I used all of them. I would, in the future, remove the skins, as they don't melt during cooking and are a little annoying to find in one's mouth.

The end result was pretty amazing. The chicken was meltingly tender, garlicky but not overwhelmingly so. The curds in the sauce were small and not entirely unappealing. Most of my liquid cooked away so I added a splash of milk at the end to create more sauce. I'd also, in the future, save some of the sage to chop up and sprinkle on at the end of cooking, for some fresh herbal flavor. This recipe will definitely go into my cooking rotation, as it was easy, used only one pot, and tasted great. Plus there's the possibility for variations: coconut milk and lime, perhaps, with makrut lime instead of sage; sub orange for the lemon; etc.

Chicken in Milk (adapted from a recipe by Jamie Oliver)

1 tablespoon butter
8-10 bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs and legs
Salt and Pepper
½ stick cinnamon
1 good handful fresh sage leaves
Zest of 2 lemons, cut into long strips with a vegetable peeler
10 -14 whole cloves of garlic, skins removed (about a whole small bulb)
2 cups whole milk + more

Melt the butter in a dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add the chicken, which you have salted and peppered, skin-side down and cook until browned on both sides. (You'll need to do this in two batches.)

Remove the chicken to a plate and drain any liquid fat from the pan, leaving the sticky crusty bits behind. Add the chicken back to the pot with the rest of the ingredients. Cover pot and bring to a boil. Turn heat down so the milk is just simmering and cook until chicken is falling-apart tender, about an hour, maybe a bit more. 90 minutes max. If you find that much of the liquid has boiled away, add half a cup or so additional milk toward the end of the cooking time, so you 'll have sauce.

Serve a few pieces of chicken per person with some of the juices spooned over, plus a green veg and some sort of starch to absorb the sauce. (I used quinoa.)



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Bloody Mary Beef

Sometimes a recipe sounds better than it actually is. I got excited about one for Bloody Mary Beef from Jamie Oliver's new Comfort Food cookbook. I like a good Bloody Mary on occasion, and think the flavors of horseradish, Worcestershire, and tomato would be smashing with beef. And it is, but if one follows the recipe to the letter, the flavors are a bit weak. Too much tomato, not enough anything else. But, if one ups the amount of aromatic Worcestershire sauce, adds horseradish (found in the original internet version but not in the cookbook version), and re-seasons the dish before serving, it's actually pretty good, with a nice depth of flavor

If I tinkered with it enough, I could probably make it great. For now, though, this is a pretty good stew to make when you have a bit of time on the weekend. It's great with horseradish mashed potatoes, but it makes such a large amount, you'll find yourself serving it again later in the week as a pasta sauce or with rice.

Bloody Mary Beef (a Jamie Oliver recipe, with some alterations)

Olive oil
1 2lb beef chuck roast
Kosher salt
Freshly ground white pepper
1 bunch of celery, trimmed and cut into 2" lengths
2 red onions, cut into eighths
1 32oz can of tomato puree
5 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
1 tablespoon prepared horseradish
1/2 teaspoon Tabasco
3 tablespoons vodka
Juice of 1 lemon
2 fresh bay leaves

Heat a large pot or dutch oven over high heat and add the olive oil. Pat the roast dry and season generously with salt and pepper on both sides. Brown meat on all sides, about 10 minutes total, and remove from pan. Add celery and onion to the pan with a pinch of salt and cook, stirring occasionally, until they start to soften.

In a bowl, stir together the tomato puree, Worcestershire, horseradish, Tabasco, vodka, and lemon juice. Put the browned meat back into the pot on top of the vegetables and add the tomato mixture plus one cup of water. Toss in the bay leaves.

Bring mixture to a boil, then turn down to a simmer. Cover pot and cook meat until fork tender, stirring occasionally, about 3 hours. Remove meat from pot and shred with two forks or slice thinly. Add back to pot and stir well. Cook an additional hour. Taste for seasoning, adding salt, pepper, and additional Worcestershire and Tabasco, if necessary. It's not going to taste exactly like a Bloody Mary, but you want to at least get the idea.

Serve with horseradish mashed potatoes.

Serves 6-8.



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Jamie Oliver's Comfort Food

I received several cookbooks for Christmas, and hope to talk a little about each of them here. First up is Jamie Oliver's new one, Comfort Food: the Ultimate Weekend Cookbook.

The book is thick and heavy, so it might seem that there are hundreds of recipes included. Rather, the bulk of the book is food porn--lots of pretty pictures of the various recipes included. And when I say "various," I mean the recipes are all over the place. Oliver's idea of comfort food includes dishes from India and Indonesia as well as British favorites like toad in the hole, sticky toffee pudding, and beans on toast.

I've bookmarked several recipes to try, including the three mentioned above, plus one called Bloody Mary Beef, which seems like a good thing to cook up on a cold winter day, as it spends 5 or so hours in the oven.

The first recipe to strike my fancy, however, was for quesadillas made with brussels sprouts. Unusual? Yes. But also quite good. I would never have thought of this combination, but it worked very well.

The recipe is pretty simple. I can't share it exactly as written, but it's not rocket science.

Slice up a large onion and half a pound of brussels sprouts (I added a handful of sliced mushrooms, too, because I had them). Toss them in a large saute pan with a pat of butter, or, use a glug of olive oil, as I did. Sprinkle in 1/4 teaspoon smoked paprika, 1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds, the leaves from 3-4 sprigs of fresh thyme, and a big pinch of salt. Cover pan and cook over medium-high heat for about ten minutes, stirring frequently. Remove lid and cook for another ten minutes or so, until onions and sprouts caramelize nicely. Turn off the heat, hit with a squeeze of lime juice, and scrape into a bowl. Wipe out the skillet and spray it with release spray.

Lay a large flour tortilla out onto a plate or cutting board. Top with enough of the brussels sprouts mixture to cover almost to the edges. Sprinkle with a handful of grated pecorino cheese (as per recipe), or your favorite combo of melting cheeses. I added some shredded sharp cheddar, too, since I had some. Top with a second tortilla.

Heat pan and carefully transfer filled tortillas, making sure not to slop filling into the pan. Cook over medium heat until browned and crisp on the bottom, 2-3 minutes. Flip gently and repeat on second side.

Transfer quesadilla to a cutting board and cut into 6-8 wedges. Serve with sour cream, salsa, guac, chopped green onion, whatever floats your boat. I whipped up a quick sauce with ground chipotle pepper, a dash of agave syrup, pinch of salt, and a squeeze of lime stirred into sour cream.

A brussels sprout quesadilla might seem weird, but it was really very delicious. Both Mr Minx and I love brussels sprouts in pretty much any form, so this was a big hit. We made two quesadillas for dinner and had enough sprouts and onions (and mushrooms) left over to make another one a couple days later.

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Posted on Minxeats.com.