Grilled Chicken Satay and Veggies with TWO sauces!!

Chicken on a stick. Glorified. Two sauces to dip them in. Nom nom nommmmmm.....

This weekend we had our very good friends over for dinner, Big (sorority sister....yeah, her real name is Amanda....) her hubby Forrest. They have a precious little family. Clyde and I were very excited to have adults over and cook them dinner and show them our cute cottage and crank up the grill and take them to a local brewery and have yummy beer. I think they were just excited to have adult time away from their beautiful daughter - so we decided the double date needed to be EPIC.

 We made a rigorous house cleaning schedule, one room clean a night! Tidy up! Be adult like and hospitable and gracious hosts! Clyde is definitely the better cleaner of the two of us, and I'm secretly very thankful for that. As usual, however, my job was to come up with the meal. I thought and brainstormed all week - I knew we wanted to grill, and then I remembered...

Chicken satay. One of my favorite things ever.

Clyde was terrified. I think he was tramatized by labor intensive memories of skewering hundreds of chicken tenders in a cold marinade for various large social events throughout his childhood. My father-in-law, Harky, has made it at a few parties and it's always been one of my favorites, and something I thought was a super special treat.

I was confident. This wasn't a party, it was 4 people! I was ready to tackle it.

And it was AWESOME.

I sort of made up my own version of the marinade and the two dips my father-in-law usually serves with this. I see version of this peanut sauce a lot online, but I haven't come across the second, the fire and ice sauce. Both are wonderful with the chicken. Forrest isn't even a fan of yogurt, but commented that he would "take this sauce on a date and ask it to come up for a cup of coffee."**

**He actually said this in a more vulgar fashion.

Here is how I made the chicken satay --- definitely requires some prep work in the morning, but then when you're ready to grill its all ready to go! Especially if you assign the hubbies the very important duty of skewering the chicken. We also grilled up some peppers and zucchini in a simpler marinade... also for dipping in the sauces :) Surprisingly, I had LOTS of these ingredients on hand already! So it's relatively cheap. And I'll go out on a limb and claim it's sort of healthy.


Chicken Satay Marinade   (for about 25 chicken tenders)
1/3 cup vegetable oil
2 tbsp fish sauce
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp white wine vinegar (or whatever you have, like citrus juice,, something acidic) 
1/3 cup of coconut milk, unsweetened
2 tbsp brown sugar
2 tsp cumin
2 tsp tumeric (new ingredient i bought, yummy!)
2 tsp ground ginger
2 cloves minced garlic
Salt and pepper to taste 
25 bamboo skewers, soaked about 30 mins before you skewer the chicken


All you have to do is whisk these ingredients together. Take a little taste and add more of what you like. The sauces have lots of flavor so make sure it isn't very spicy or anything. I put all of the chicken tenders in a big gallon ziplock bag and dump the marinade in, close the bag, shake it up, stick in the fridge. Ours marinated for a few hours, but you could get away with letting it sit for an hour or two.

You can also go ahead and put your veggies in a second bag and marinade these too.... we did peppers and zucchini. I marinade these with vegetable oil, salt, pepper, crushed red pepper flakes, dried herb of choice, and minced garlic.

You an ALSO make the two sauces ahead of time!  Here is how I made them.

Thai Peanut Sauce  (in the orange bowl)
3 tbsp creamy peanut butter
1/2 cup unsweetened coconut milk (more to be creamier)
2 tbsp fish sauce
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tsp cumin
2 tsp ginger
2 cloves garlic, minced 
Juice of a fresh lime
Bunch of cilantro, chopped
Dash of sriracha, to taste **
Salt and pepper to taste

Whisk it all together, taste, adjust, done! **I made this sauce milder because the next one packs a LOT of heat!!

Fire and Ice Sauce (in the blue bowl)
1 cup plain yogurt
1 cup greek yogurt
1 jalapeno pepper, minced **
Bunch of cilantro, chopped
Bunch of fresh mint, chopped
2 cloves of garlic, minced
Juice of a fresh lime
Salt and pepper to taste

Again, just whisk them together, taste, and adjust. **Seriously, taste. My beef with jalapenos is that they are all different spice levels. When I made this batch the jalapeno was SUPER spicy, so I added even more yogurt to tone it down.

Now you did all the work before your friends come over! Have your grill master (if that you, you are awesome) fire up the grill and cook the chicken satay about five minutes on each side.... medium high heat. Grill your veggies, serve with the sauces, DONE.

The chicken on the skewers! We made Forrest and Clyde do that part.

The veggies post grilling. Yuuummmm.

The chicken on our charcoal grill! Darcy is investigating....

We had so much fun and it was so delicious. Big had hers with a nice glass of reisling, and the boys and I drank a hoppy IPA. Clyde served up homemade strawberry buttermilk ice cream for dessert....maybe he'll do a cameo blog post about that, so delicious.

Happy Memorial Day everyone! Hope you all enjoy grilling and thanking our troops! I'll leave you with my favorite picture of the weekend.... baby Reagan meeting Mr. Darcy yesterday morning :) So sweet!!

Sausage Skillet Dinner

I love one pot dinners.

One dish. One pot to clean. Simmers together, put a lid on it, stick the leftovers in the fridge. SO MUCH WIN. And so much delish.

This recipe is my sister-in-law's, with a few minor tweaks of my own. She put it in a recipe box set for my husband when he got his own place after he graduated college (eons ago, hardy har). I think I use that box set more than him now, and this is a favorite we always go back to, especially on cold and rainy days when you want something comforting.

Isn't her recipe book neat? She did a photo book and decorated index cards with cute little decorations.

Anyway, the recipe ---

The Ingredients
1 green pepper, chopped
1 onion, chopped
1 lb your favorite ground sausage
1 large can (28oz) crushed tomatoes
1 can (14 oz or so) WHOLE tomatoes
1 tblsp sugar
1 tblsp chili powder
Dash of crushed red pepper for a kick
Salt and pepper to taste
About half a box of macaroni noodles
Dollops of Greek yogurt for garnish
Shredded cheddar cheese for garnish

How to Make It
Brown the first three ingredients in a large pot over medium heat. Make sure you break apart the sausage as you go.

Next, the rest of the ingredients except the Greek yogurt and cheese. Use your spatula to break up the whole tomatoes -- watch out, they may splatter a bit.  Mix everything together evenly and reduce the heat to a lower setting, and cover the pot. Stir occasionally. It it all finished when the macaroni noodles have cooked through, about 20 minutes or so later. Top each serving with greek yogurt and cheddar cheese. Yummy!!!!

Hope you all enjoy this one - veggies, sausage, cheese, noodles, and tasty. Ta da!

Anyone else has a favorite one pot meal?? :)

Cheesy Pulled Pork WonTons with Gingery Dipping Sauce

Last weekend I was quite proud of myself --- I spied an amazing sale in Food Lion a nice cut of pork, a Boston Butt (which I always tend to slip and call bottom butt, much to my husband's amusement.) It was originally 30 bucks, but it was marked down on manager special to about 9 bucks.

Bingo. Bought it.

I cooked it low and slow all day and it made for a delicious dinner. Needless to say, I had tons of pulled pork leftovers, and it was the star of my dishes for the week. This was one of our favorites.

Cheesy, salty, and crispy wontons with a fresh Asian inspired dipping sauce. It made for a great light lunch snack before hubby's soccer game. And I got to incorporate one of my new ingredient obsessions.... fish sauce.

 I tease my father-in-law relentlessly for using this in many of his dishes. He swears by it, and often substitutes it for salt in his recipes. It is also a great base for any dipping sauce.

Cheesy Pulled Pork Wonton Filling
Package of wonton wrappers (I get mine from Food Lion) 
 1/2 pound (about) of leftover pulled pork
1/2 package of cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup freshly grated parm cheese 
3 tblspoons greek yogurt
3 cloves of garlic, through garlic press
1 tsp grated fresh ginger
Pinch of salt and pepper
Pinch of crushed red pepper flakes

Gingery Dipping Sauce
1/2 cup of fish sauce
Splash of soy sauce
1/4 cup white wine vinegar (or whatever you have)
Freshly grated ginger, to taste
1 clove of garlic

How to make them:

Preheat the oven to 350.

Put all of your filling ingredients together in a big bowl and mix together. Prepare a large cookies sheet with non stick spray. Then, put a dollop of the filling in your wonton mixture.

Close the flap to make a triangle and kind of mush it so it sort of seals together. Twist the two corners up to make it look wonton-y... I'm not a perfectionist so mine weren't exactly pretty. Place them on the cookie sheet and bake them for about 15-20 minutes or until they look crispy.

In the meantime, make your dipping sauce. I am usually a guess and adjust kind of person with sauces, so start with the basics and add whatever you like, depending on what kind of flavors you want. 

Then, you're finished! They make for a wonderful snack or very light lunch :)

Tip about the ginger: I  put my ginger in the freezer and just grate it with a cheese grater... very easy to handle that way! 

Frittata

I am extremely lucky and blessed to have a husband that loves to cook too. When we were dating he probably enjoyed it more than me, even! Whenever I went to visit him I would beg and pout and stomp my feet to get him to take me out to dinner. (Okay, maybe not that dramatically, although I'm sure he would beg to differ.) For the sake of his pocket book and sanity, he would tempt me with a really yummy meal that he would cook instead. One of his specialties was frittata, which is where I learned to make it.

Frittata is a funny dish. It is so easy, so elegant, and so delicious. It pretty much works with whatever your favorite ingredients are, or better yet, what you have in the fridge. It also looks super impressive, bonus!

Below is what I like to typically include in my frittatas, but you can swtich it up with what YOU like! Yay!

What you need: 
6 eggs
1 cup milk
1 lb sausage, browned
1 medium onion, chopped
1 roma tomato, chopped
1 handful fresh herb (parsley or cilantro)
2 cloves of garlic, minced 
Dash of red pepper flakes
Dry herbs of your choice (hubby and I like dried mint) 
1/2 cup diced fresh mozzarella cheese
Handful fresh parm cheese to grate on top
Salt and pepper to taste

How to make it:

Preheat the oven to 350. 

First, you need a large deep skillet pan that can go into the oven. Pretty heavy duty one, yup. Brown the sausage over medium heat and break it apart. Once it is browned, remove it from the skillet and put into a large bowl. Next, sautee the onion, garlic, and tomato in the same skillet in the juices from the sausage. Add them to the same bowl with the sausage so they can cool a little bit.

Meanwhile, beat the six eggs and milk in another larger bowl. Add your spices and any dry herbs you would like. Add the chopped up mozzarella. Add the sausage onion tomato garlic mixture once it has cooled a bit and blend with the egg mixture. Add you fresh herbs now too!  I like to use a whisk.

 

Now you can return the egg mixture to the skillet, which is still over the medium heat. Let it cook for a few minutes and scrape down egg as it cooks, almost like a really big omelette thing. Make sure the sausage and stuff doesn't settle down on the bottom and is spread pretty evenly.

After the frittata has cooked a little bit on the stovetop, put it in the oven and bake it for about 20 minutes. If you check it and its still really jiggly, it isn't ready yet. You will know its ready if it is set and form and you can put a fork in it and it comes out clean. Then, its ready! yay!

Sprinkle fresh grated parm on top.... mmm.

Way easier than quiche.... you don't need a crust and it is just as good if not better.

I hope you enjoy, I'd love to hear your unique frittata ideas! 

Chicken "Parmesan" with Goat Cheese

It's April!!! Also known as the month of my birth. :) I can't wait for some warmer spring weather! 

Confession: I love cheese. I LOVE cheese. It is the best. Goat cheese, if you haven't tried it, is one of the best ones - tart, creamy, delicious.

I came up with this idea in college with my friend Ashley. We used to make a dip for bread with marinara and goat cheese as a yummy snack when we were hanging out. One of my favorite meals in Chicken Parmesan, so I decided to try and combine the ideas. I've been making it ever since ! :)

Spicy marinara, breaded chicken, and goat cheese with pasta.

What you need:
3 Chicken Breasts, cut in half
1 egg + splash of water
Flour, seasoned with salt and pepper
Seasoned Panko bread crumbs
1 turn of olive oil
1 package of goat cheese
Large jar of marinara sauce (or make your own)
1 lb of spaghetti (or your favorite pasta)
Crushed red pepper flakes or cayenne pepper to taste 

How you make it: 

(Preheat your oven to 450).

First, clean up the chicken. Cut the chicken breasts in half. Meanwhile, heat up the olive oil over medium heat in a large sautee pan.

Next, pick out three larger bowls for an assembly line. The first bowl should the seasoned flour, next is the egg wash (mix the egg and water together), and last is the panko bread crumbs. Get ready to make your chicken! I like to use tongs so I don't keep touching the chicken, and it is easier to coat with each layer. (My chicken is tiny, so my assembly line is a little cramped). Prepare a large rectangle backing dish with some of the marinara sauce on the bottom, you are going to place the chicken on top.

**Note: If you make your own marinara sauce or buy your favorite from the store, I like to add some cayenne pepper or crushed red chili flakes to taste because I prefer a spicy marinara with this dish. It's up to you! Try heating it up in a sauce pan and adding more of what you like, make it your own!

Once you coat the chicken in each layer (flour, egg, bread crumbs), sear the chicken for four minutes on each side. Place into the large rectangle baking dish when done. Work in batches until all of the chicken is done and in the baking dish. Top the chicken with more of the marinara, and then place dollops of goat cheese on top. Bake in the preheated oven for 15-20 minutes until the chicken is done. While it is cooking, you can go ahead and get your pasta ready.

Serve it up with your pasta! This would be yummy with some bread and a fresh salad too if you like.

Anyone else have a twist on a classic recipe? :) 

Sausage Kale Fettuccine

I got this recipe from my lovely in-laws. They cook a lot with sausage and pork, probably inspired by their pig farm, Pink House Farm. They always have some on hand and have a lot of creative ways to use it. For anyone in the Richmond area, you need to check them out!

This dish is one of my absolute favorite things to make for dinner. The awesome thing is that it only requires a handful of ingredients and it is easy to make! It is perfect for a winter night meal with a glass of white wine, and super comforting. ....and the kale makes it healthy, right?..... right!

Ingredients:
1 lb ground sausage (your preference)
1 lb fettuccine noodles
2 bunches of kale
1 cup of chicken stock
Parmesan cheese, grated (your preference how much)

How you make it: 

Heat up a large pot of water and bring to a gentle boil. Tear the kale off the stems and place into the water to blanch. While you wait for the kale, brown the sausage in the biggest skillet you own. When the kale has cooked for a few minutes, scoop the kale out and put it in the skillet with the cooked sausage. Sautee the kale with the cooked sausage so it absorbs all of the flavor.

Place the fettuccine noodles into the boiling water you cooked the kale in. Add the chicken stock to the kale and sausage once the kale has really cooked down, and reduce the heat on the pan. Once the noodles have cooked, drain them and put them in the large skillet and mix everything together. Top off with parm cheese.

Sausage Peppers and Onions with Garlic Smashed Potatoes

Sometimes you need to cook something quick and easy... I think a lot of us find ourselves in this situation, actually. It can be from exhaustion, laziness, or you are just ready to eat!

This was the predicament I was in last night, but for a slightly different reason! It was our first night with our new dog, Mr. Darcy! We adopted him yesterday from the Roanoke SPCA. We love him and he is doing wonderfully. I picked him up after work and it was probably the most hilarious car ride ever... I caught every train and light of course. Mr. Darcy decided to show his affection by constantly licking the side of my face, which can make driving a little difficult!!

Anyways, I knew I needed to do something easy and fast for dinner so I could spend lots of time with Darcy and not a lot of time running around fixing interesting smelling things that he's not allowed to have.

So, I went to a stand-by - my version of Sausage Pepper and Onions, which I serve with Garlic Smashed Potatoes! It is also a very manly sort of dish, so you can convince your hubby/boyfriend/fiance whoever that you made it just for him! :)

The Ingredients:

1 package of your favorite sausage links (we like Bratwurst)
1 medium yellow onion
1 green bell pepper (or whatever colors you like)
2 tblspoons of olive oil
5-6 Yukon Gold Potatoes (medium to small sized, more if you want)
4 cloves of garlic, smashed with garlic press (or more, we love garlic)
2 tblspoons of butter 
1/2 cup or so of half n half (or milk)
Fresh parsley
Salt and Pepper to taste

How to make it: 

First, dice up your Yukon potatoes into quarter ish sizes. I leave the skins on. Put in a large sauce pot with salt and water, enough to cover the potatoes. Bring the water and potatoes to a gentle boil. Check the potatoes until they are fork tender, about 15 minutes or so. Once they are tender, drain the potatoes and put them back in the pot. Add the half n half, butter, garlic, fresh parsley, and salt and pepper. Then, smash them all together with a potato masher. Taste and add more of what you like! :)

While you wait on the potatoes, heat up a large skillet with the olive oil on medium low heat. Place the sausages in the skillet. I like to use tongs to flip them easier. Check them every few minutes or so and turn so they cook evenly on all sides. I also tend to move them around in the pan for even cooking. They start to brown like this, but that's good:

  The sausages take about 15 minutes. I check mine with a fork and knife to make sure there is no pink in the center. Once they are done, transfer them to a plate. Chop up the onions and peppers and put them into the same skillet you used for the sausages. The onions and peppers are going to absorb all of that amazing flavor.

After ten minutes, they start to look like this:

Yummy!!!!!

Once you are happy with your peppers and onions, dinner is ready! I put the potatoes down first, then the peppers onions and sausage links on top. Serve with your favorite beer :)

Anyone else have a man-pleasing easy dinner? :)