Chicken & Broccoli Stir-fry

A successful stir-fry requires a number of things:

• You need to have everything ready before you start cooking. Things happen fast with a stir-fry because it is a high-heat cooking method. If you don't have every ingredient measured and ready to go, things will go south quickly. Garlic burns, meat overcooks. Not pretty. Having everything ready to go is called "mise en place." It's French for putting in place. Mise en place is how restaurants can turn out hundreds of from-scratch meals in very little time. And, it's not just for restaurants. It will make you a better home cook.
• You need to cut your raw ingredients in similar bite-sized pieces. Food needs to cook quickly and if there are big hunks of meat or broccoli in your stir-fry, or if everything is cut in very different sizes, it will not cook quickly nor will it cook evenly. You want the meat and veggies in equivalent bite-sized pieces.
• You need to use really high heat. A stir-fry cooks in 10 minutes or less. For that to happen, you need to get your skillet or wok as hot as you can. Of course, because you are working with very high heat, you have to be on top of what's going on. No answering the phone. No digging through the fridge for ingredients (see first bullet again). It also means that you need to keep stirring the ingredients to keep things from burning. There's a reason it's called stir-fry. The high heat is also what makes it taste so good, so don't be afraid. 

This is about as simple as you can get in a stir-fry. It's not sophisticated but it's quick and filling. Future posts will feature other stir-fries with more complex flavors.

Chicken & Broccoli Stir-fry
(serves 2-3)

1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 teaspoon cornstarch
1 tablespoon dry sherry or Chinese rice wine (see Note)
¾ pound skinless boneless chicken breast, cut into slices about ¼" thick, 2 x 1" long and wide (see Variations)
½ pound broccoli, cut into bite-sized florets, stems peeled and sliced 1/4" thick (see Variations)
1 ½ tablespoons vegetable oil
½ - 1 teaspoon minced ginger, depending on your love of ginger
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tablespoons chicken or vegetable broth
additional soy sauce, if desired

Combine soy sauce, cornstarch and dry sherry in a medium bowl. Mix enough to dissolve cornstarch. Add chicken breast and toss to coat meat with marinade. Marinate in the fridge for 10-30 minutes. Drain chicken pieces, reserving 1 tablespoon of marinade.

Heat oil in skillet or wok until very hot. The oil will shimmer and ripple (but not smoke) when it's hot enough. Don't walk away while the oil is heating up because it can go from hot enough to bursting into flames quickly. [If this ever happens to you, don't panic! Cover the pan with a lid and remove from the heat. Do not remove lid until pan has cooled.]

Add chicken to skillet and immediately start stirring it around. Stir fry for a few minutes until chicken begins to brown. Add ginger, garlic and broccoli. Stir fry for another 5-6 minutes until broccoli is done to your liking.

Add broth and 1 tablespoon of reserved marinade. Cook for 30 seconds. The sauce should boil and thicken somewhat.

Serve with rice, passing soy sauce if additional salt is needed.

Note: Though we don't generally recommend cooking sherry, if you aren't old enough to buy actual sherry, it will do if it's all you can get. Just remember that it has a lot of added salt so you probably won't need additional soy sauce. You can also find Chinese cooking rice wine in most Asian markets, but it also has salt added.

Variations: Beef, pork, shrimp, scallops, or tofu can be substituted for the chicken. They will all cook in about the same time if they are cut into a similar size. Jumbo shrimp should be cut in half lengthwise. Tofu should be cut into 1x1" cubes. Other vegetables can be used, such as bok choy, Napa cabbage, mushrooms, or green beans. Bok choy, Napa cabbage, and mushrooms will cook in less time, about 3 minutes. Green beans will take as long as broccoli to cook.

Easy Indian Samosas

I've been lucky to visit India twice. Both times I surprised my hosts by requesting they only take me to eat Indian vegetarian food. Why would I want to eat pizza when I could get wonderful hearty and spicy dishes that take hours to make?

Back home, I searched for an easy recipe for my favorite Indian appetizer, Samosas. I hate deep frying foods, as it spits and makes a greasy mess of my stove.  This recipe uses Puff Pastry and is baked instead of fried. It is easier to make, but more importantly, easier to clean up after!

These are a great appetizer for a holiday party. You can make them half the size of these pictured for a one bite version or cut them up before serving. If you make smaller ones, watch them in the oven, as they will take less time to bake. They are wonderful right out of the oven, and nearly as good served at room temperature, perfect for the party buffet table.

You can serve them with a chutney, such as Major Grey's or try this simple apricot sauce that you can mix up in no time at all.

Don't try reheating the samosas in the microwave, as you'll get a greasy mess.  But, they reheat nicely if you take them out of the fridge to warm up for 10 minutes, then pop them in a 350° F oven for another 5 minutes.

Samosas
(makes 18)

1 package puff pastry sheets, thawed
3 medium size potatoes
4 Tablespoons vegetable oil
1 medium size onion, peeled and minced
1 cup shelled fresh or defrosted frozen peas
1 Tablespoon peeled and grated fresh ginger
1 fresh hot green chili, minced
1 ½ teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 teaspoon garam masala
1 teaspoon ground roasted cumin seeds
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
2 Tablespoons lemon juice
1 egg, beaten with 1 Tablespoon water

Place the potatoes in a pot of cold water and boil them for 20-40 minutes, until they are soft enough to cut into, but not mushy. Cool them to room temperature and then peel the potatoes and dice them into roughly ¼ inch square pieces.  Heat the 4 Tablespoons oil in a 10- to 12-inch skillet over medium heat.  Put in the onion, stirring and frying until it turns a light-brown color.  Add the peas, ginger, green chili, salt, coriander, garam masala, cumin, cayenne pepper, lemon juice and 3 Tablespoons of water. Stir it together and then add the potatoes. Keep the heat low and mix the spices with the potatoes. Add additional water, 1 Tablespoon at a time, if the mixture dries out. Continue cooking gently, stirring frequently, for 3-4 minutes more. Check salt and lemon juice. Turn off the heat and let the potato mixture cool.

Heat the oven to 400° F. Unfold the pastry sheets on a lightly floured surface. Roll each pastry sheet to a 12-inch square. Cut each sheet into 9 (about 4-inch) squares, making 18 in all. Divide the potato mixture among the pastry squares, placing about 1 scant Tablespoon on each. Brush the edges of the pastry squares with the egg-water mixture. Fold the pastry over the filling to form a triangle and crimp the edges with a fork to seal. Brush the filled pastries with the egg wash. Place the pastries onto 2 baking sheets.

Bake for 20 minutes or until the pastries are golden brown.

Note: The filling freezes well, so you can freeze ½ of it and only make 1 sheet worth of samosas if you don't need enough for a party. Make sure to thaw the filling completely before assembling the samosas.

Simple, but Spicy Apricot Dipping Sauce

½ cup apricot preserves

1 Tablespoon water
2 teaspoons lemon juice
2 teaspoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
¼ teaspoon fresh hot green chili, minced (optional)

Mix together and if you like a smooth sauce, whir it up in a blender or food processor.

Simple Steamed Broccoli with Garlic

Broccoli is a cool season crop so it is likely to show up on sale during the fall and winter, in other words, right now.

Some people are happy to eat vegetables plain - that would be Ronnie. I, on the other hand, like stuff on my vegetables. Stuff like olive oil, toasted nuts, garlic, olives, capers. It would be a shame to skip the vegetables just because you are afraid of adding a little fat and salt. If liking your vegetables means gussying them up a bit, don't feel guilty about it.

This is a very easy but tasty way to prepare broccoli. Any leftovers are good in a green salad.

Simple Garlic Broccoli
(serves 3-4)

2 cloves of garlic, sliced thinly
1 head of broccoli, broken into small florets and stems peeled and cut into 1/4" slices
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/4 tsp salt, or more to taste

Heat 1 Tbl olive oil in a medium saucepan or skillet with a cover over medium heat.

Add garlic and saute until fragrant but not browned. Don't burn it - it turns bitter.

Add broccoli and toss to cover with oil. Add 1 tbl water,  which should immediately create a lot of steam. Cover and steam broccoli for 5 minutes, until crisp-tender. Try a piece after 4 minutes if you like your broccoli crisp. If it's not cooked enough, cook for another minute.

Remove the cover, turn up the heat to medium-high and cook another minute to evaporate most of the water.

Drizzle with remaining tablespoon of olive oil and season to taste with salt. Serve immediately.

Penne with Sausage, Tomatoes and Cheese

School of Eating Good just held a class on easy pasta dishes. Two of the dishes have already appeared on the blog: Bowties with Pesto, and Easy Mac and Cheese.

Here's the 3rd recipe our students prepared: Penne with Sausage, Tomatoes and Cheese. It's really easy and really delicious.


Penne with Sausage, Tomatoes and Cheese
Makes 6 generous servings; total cost is $11.50

1 box (14.5 oz. to 1 lb.) penne
1 lb. mild Italian sausage
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 Tablespoon tomato paste (see Note)
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon pepper
¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 (14.5 oz.) can petite-diced tomatoes, un-drained
½ cup heavy cream
¼ cup chopped basil
1 cup grated parmesan cheese + more for topping

Cook penne in a large pot of boiling salted water for 10 minutes (until al dente). Save about ½ cup of the pasta water and drain the pasta. Wipe out the pasta pot and in it cook the sausage and garlic over medium heat until the sausage is cooked through, stirring to crumble it. Add the tomato paste, salt, pepper, pepper flakes, tomatoes, and cream and bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the pasta, cheese, and basil to the sausage mixture and stir to cover the pasta with the sauce.  Add some of the pasta water if it looks dry. Serve with additional cheese for topping.

Note: The most cost-effective way to buy tomato paste is in a tube. It's now available in most supermarkets. It keeps in your fridge for a long time, making it a much better choice for recipes that require just a little tomato paste.

Microwave Rice

Cooking rice on a stove is not as easy as people would have you believe. If you set the heat too high, it can boil over, creating an awful mess. Leave it on the heat a little too long, and you end with rice bonded to your pan. Yet another mess! Too much water, end up with mush. Too little water, crunchy rice. Ick.

I have a confession. I'm a trained chef and even I have trouble getting rice right cooked on the stove (when I worked in restaurants, we steamed the rice in a big steamer which was nearly foolproof). A rice cooker does ok, but who needs another appliance cluttering up the counter? You have a microwave cluttering up your counter already and it happens to be a great rice cooker. Some people have no choice; a microwave is the only thing they have.

Rice is a staple, so having a good method for cooking it in the microwave would be nice, wouldn't it? There are a lot of bad microwave rice recipes out there. By bad, I mean, recipes that totally trash your microwave. I have done extensive testing of recipes and this one really works without creating a pool of starchy rice water in the bottom of your microwave.

Microwave Rice
(makes 3 cups, serves 4-6)

1 3/4 cup water or broth
1 cup rice (converted, jasmine, basmati, long-grain)

Place water and rice in a 4 cup microwaveable bowl or measuring cup. Cover with plastic wrap. Microwave on high for 4 minutes. The water should be boiling at this point, but not frothing and going over the sides. Microwave on low (20-30%) power for another 20 minutes. Nearly all the water should be absorbed at the end. Let stand for 5 minutes

On high powered microwaves, 30% is enough to cause boil-overs. Try 30% and if looks like it's going to blow, reduce power to 20%. If it doesn't boil at all in the first minute after you reduced the power, try 40%. The first time you try this, you'll want to keep an eye on it. Unfortunately, given the different power ratings on microwaves (anywhere from 500-1200 watts), it's impossible to give the perfect recipe for every microwave oven.

Knives - what you need to know

Good quality knives are one of the most important tools in your kitchen. They are an investment since a good knife will last for decades, and like most investments, they aren't inexpensive. You don't need to get the most expensive knife but you definitely don't want to get the cheapest knife! You don't need a whole knife block of them either. Get yourself a chef's knife and a paring knife. You'll want a serrated bread knife too but that isn't nearly as important as the first two.

My well-used knives: 10" Chef's, Santuko, paring

Chef's knives come in various sizes, the most common size is 8" to 10". Most people with small hands prefer the smaller size, but a lot of this depends on what you are used to handling. Another option, if a big knife scares you, is a Santoku. It's a Japanese knife with a blunted tip and a shorter blade. It's also an excellent all-purpose knife and it's a style that is now readily available. In either style, you want a knife that has an entirely steel blade. The more metal, the more durable it will be. Skip those plastic knives with a thin strip of metal embedded in the plastic. The handle should be comfortable in your hand. Different brands have different handles. You need to hold them to figure out what you like. I like my Wusthof. Ronnie likes the F.Dick knives. That doesn't mean you'll like either of these. Hold them and decide for yourself.  To hold a chef's knife correctly, choke up on the handle, putting your thumb on one side and your fingers on the other.  Don't put your index finger on the top along the blade; your hand will tire quickly with that grip.

Paring knives are small knives with a pointy tip. You should be able to pick one up cheaply. Many kitchen stores even give away paring knives when you purchase a decent chef's knife.

People often think that dull knives are safer than sharp knives. This is untrue. A dull knife is still absolutely capable of doing a lot of damage to your fingers. But, because it is dull, you need to push a  lot harder to get it to cut through food. This extra force makes it more dangerous. It can bounce off food when you least expect it, ending up in your hand. Sharp knives require almost no work to cut through food. No pushing, no whacking, no forcing. Keep your knives sharp and respect that they are sharp. You won't have to work as hard in the kitchen.

We recommend that you find someplace that will sharpen your knives. Our local hardware store sharpens knives, as does some of the supermarkets. You won't need to sharpen them often - maybe once or twice a year depending on how much you use your knife - but you'll be happy you did. It's also important to steel your knife, to keep the edge really sharp. Here's a short video from Alton Brown that distills steeling and sharpening down to its bare essentials.