Chicken & Dumplings - A Favorite Comfort Food!

It's a cold, wet weekend here in my little corner of Texas (unusual for our area, which has been in a drought for the past 15 years), and I got it into my head that I needed some comfort food.  One of my favorite comfort foods is chicken & dumplings, just the way my mom used to make it!  I love either style of dumpling - flat-rolled or drop-biscuit - but my favorite is the fluffy drop-biscuit dumplings, so that's what I made.

It seems there are so many ways to both cook and serve chicken & dumplings!  Apparently, I am a starch junkie, because I like it served over egg noodles.  Mmmm.  And I like the dumplings actually dropped into the pot, not just sitting on top and browned like actual biscuits.  My mom tried that a few times, but I think I complained so much each time that it was just like a chicken pot pie that she went back to dropping them in.  That's not to say that this recipe served over biscuits isn't good, because it sure is!  But the drop-dumplings just can't be beat!  Restaurants usually make flat-rolled dumplings, but here in New Braunfels, the New Braunfels Smokehouse makes them just like my mama did.  But today, I need a pot of my own!

 

This recipe is a really hard one to write, because not only do I never really measure ingredients, but it's never been written down in my family, either.  Oops.  So ... I guess I'm breaking new ground here. Before I start on the recipe itself, let's talk about the chicken:

You have a few options with the chicken part of this recipe:

1. The most time-consuming is to use a whole roaster chicken boiled in a stockpot with slightly salted water.  When it is cooked, you need to pull out the chicken, the strain the broth in the stockpot to get the icky bits out.  Save the broth in the stockpot to make the rest of the dish with, and set the chicken aside.  When it is cool enough to handle, pull the chicken off and shred, then add back to the pot.  This method produces the chicken-y-est flavored broth, since the bones are in there boiling, too.
2. The next method is to use a deli-roasted chicken.  Use the same boiling method as above, just don't boil as long.  This will give you a more highly-seasoned broth as your dish's base.
3. Finally, if you're in a hurry, used a bag of frozen, skinless chicken (I prefer dark meat to light in this dish, so I would use thighs).  Boil as above, but add a few cubes of chicken bouillion cubes once you've removed the chicken and strained the broth (what IS that foam that settles on top, anyway?!).

Okay, so on with the rest of the recipe!*

CHICKEN AND DROP DUMPLINGS

Ingredients:

Chicken (see above)
Broth (see above)
2 onions, chopped
1 bunch celery, chopped
2 tsp. powdered thyme
2 tbsp. parsley flakes
1 tbsp. minced garlic
1 large bag of baby carrots (or more if you like)
salt & pepper to taste
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup (or a bit more) water

Add all ingredients except flour and water to the broth and simmer to allow the flavor to enhance, about 45 minutes. Taste now and then and adjust accordingly.  It will look and taste like chicken soup.

In a small bowl, whisk together the flour and water.  Make sure you whisk away all lumps.  Stir the mixture into the stockpot to thicken the broth to make a thin gravy-like texture.  If you feel you need to do this again, that's fine, too.  The broth will thicken as it simmers.

Now it's time to make the dumplings.  I use the recipe that's on the Bisquick box, but I double it because I make such a huge pot of this dish:

2 cups Bisquick baking mix
2/3 cup milk
(double the above to make a bigger batch if you like)
Salt & pepper

Whisk together the baking mix and milk in a medium bowl, add a bit of salt and pepper to flavor the dough.  Once it is thoroughly mixed, drop it by heaping tablespoons-ful into the stockpot, which should be at a boil.  Cook it uncovered for 10 minutes, then poke the dumplings down a bit with a spoon to re-coat them with the gravy-broth.  Cover the pot, and cook another 10 minutes.  Enjoy immediately, served as is, or over freshly cook egg noodles.

*Right about there, I'd insert a pic of the chicken & dumplings that I made.  Guess what I found out?  Chicken & dumplings doesn't photograph well, and looks kind of gross.  So I skipped that part.  You're welcome.  

It's a Little Chilly, Let's Have Chili!

Although I'm a New Orleans girl at heart, I live in Texas now, and Texans love them some chili! Once you move here from a place like New Orleans, you learn to cook all over again, because you can't get your usual ingredients (seafood!  pickle meat!  Blue Plate mayonnaise!*), so you get some new favorites, like King Ranch Chicken, Texas Caviar**, and good ol' Texas chili.  I tend to like my chili considerably spicier than most Texans, it seems, but I've had to temper it down for my kids (though they enjoy a little kick, too!).  Some trial-and-error provided me with this yummy recipe.

Today was our first good "cold snap"*** of the season, and everyone rushed to the grocery store for chili fixin's (yes, I spelled that right).  I still can't bring myself to serve it over Fritos****, but I do like some cheese with my chili, and my mom always served chili over elbow macaroni, so I decided way back when to serve mine with baked macaroni & cheese.  Ohhhhhh, my, it makes such a delicious, rich, creamy dish out of standard Chili Mac!  I occasionally serve it with cornbread, but tonight it's going to be biscuits***** ... mmmmm!

Mmmmm ... can you smell it?  Yum.

TEXAS CHILI

Ingredients:

4 lbs. ground beef

2 onions, chopped

2 tblsp. minced garlic

2 15-oz. cans of tomato sauce

1 sauce-can of water

2 tblsp. cumin

6-8 tblsp. chili powder (be generous!)

2 tblsp. paprika

1 generous tsp. cayenne pepper

salt to taste

Brown the ground beef, drain, and set aside.  In the same pot, saute the chopped onions and minced garlic until the onions get translucent.  To the onions in the pot, add all the ingredients except the cayenne pepper and salt. Simmer over low heat for about 30 minutes.  Add the cooked and drained ground beef and the cayenne pepper (less if you're a sissy!) and simmer on an extremely low heat until you're ready to eat it.  Just before serving, taste it and add salt if needed,

I line my pan with foil for easy clean-up.
This is a service to my family, because she who cooks does not clean up.

BAKED MACARONI & CHEESE

Ingredients:

1 large package elbow macaroni

shredded cheddar cheese (lots!)

2-3 cups of milk

1/3 cup flour

1 tblsp. sugar

2 eggs

Cook the macaroni according to package directions.  Pour half of it in your baking pan (greased or lined).  Generously sprinkle the shredded cheese to completely cover the pasta.  Pour the other half of the pasta on top, and top that with even more shredded cheese.  Now it's time to make the custard that holds it all together and makes it creamy, rich and a little bit sweet!  In a mixing bowl, combine 2 to 3 cups of milk (just estimate how much it'll take to come up 3/4 of the way in your pan with your mac), 1/3 cup of flour, 1 tblsp. of sugar, and 2 eggs, and whisk it well.  Pour immediately over your macaroni and cheese layers.  Bake in a 375° oven for about 30-45 minutes, until the liquid has stopped bubbling and the cheese is beginning to brown on top.

Scoop out and serve in individual bowls and top with chili.  Mmmmm.  Comfort food.

Oh, you can go all out and round this out with a green salad, but I call the onions and tomatoes in the chili my veggies for the meal and just have some kind of bread (like I said, tonight it'll be biscuits!) and some Turtle Pie****** for dessert.  Y'all enjoy -- we will!

*I can actually get good ol' Blue Plate at HEB now, so I don't need to import it anymore!

**I'll post those recipes in the future!!

***Seriously, that means that the high was 60°.  Any colder, and people freak out instead of enjoying it.

****They call it Frito Pie.  I've actually tasted it and it's not too bad, I sort of like the crunch!  But I just can't deal with serving Fritos and telling my kids it's dinner.

*****Yeah, they're Pillsbury Grands.  No recipe forthcoming.  Homemade biscuits are delish, but I just didn't have it in me tonight.

French Bread

Growing up, nearly all our meals included some delicious, fresh French bread.  The crisp crust and light, meltaway insides were perfect compliments to almost any meal.  Cornbread was better with black-eyed peas, Italian bread was better with spaghetti, but French bread was the staple for anything else.

Real French bread, light and airy inside, crisp outside

New Orleans had many different bakeries that mass-produced French bread, but in this case, the words "mass-produced" had no negative connotation.  Every yard-long loaf was perfect, all the time. They were delivered to grocery stores in individual paper sleeves, which were all placed into a large brown paper bag and stood upright in the bakery department, never next to the sliced sandwich breads.  Some grocery stores made them in-house, but they packaged them in plastic bags, which ruined the crust.  Boooo.

Putting French bread in a sealed, plastic sleeve ensures
 that it gets soft and chewy outside and doughy inside.
Yuck.

Here in Texas, "french bread" has neither the shape nor texture of the real stuff.  Closer are "baguettes," but they're still not quite right.  So, my only option was to learn to make French bread.  I discovered it is actually quite easy!  This recipe is done in a bread machine until after the dough/manual cycle is finished, then completed in the oven.
  

This is what French bread should look like inside: full of air pockets, not layered.
And that deep tan crust should be crisp and flaky!

French Bread

Ingredients:

1.5 cups water

4 cups white bread flour (I use King Arthur)

2.5 tbsp. sugar

2 tsp. salt

1.5 tsp. fast-rise yeast OR 2.5 tsp. active dry yeast

In your bread machine, first put the flour, sugar and salt.  Stir lightly and build up the center to a mountain shape.  Make a well in the peak of the mountain.  I guess that would mean it looks more like a volcano - go for it.  Pour the water in around the outside of the mountain shape, and then carefully pour the yeast in the well.  You can immediately begin your cycle (depending on your machine, use the white, French, rapid or delay cycle), or leave it sit until you're ready to mix it up.Once the dough/manual cycle is complete, remove the bread dough and turn it out on a lightly-floured surface and carefully form a long loaf.  You may want to make two smaller loaves depending on the size of your oven.  Do not knead or punch down.   Let it rest and rise for about an hour (it may double in size, which is why you may want to make two loaves).  Preheat your oven to 350.  Brush the loaves with water (which will give a light-colored, crisp crust) or egg white (which will give a more caramel color, still crisp), or a mixture of the two, which is what I usually do.  I just barely brush with an egg-white, and liberally brush with water after that.  Bake for about 30 minutes.  Check often, since ovens vary.  Serve immediately, to dunk into whatever creole deliciousness you've already whipped up -- or make a po-boy!  Actually, po-boy bread is wider than French, but that's a whole 'nother blog post.

Roast beef po-boy, dressed*!

*"Dressed" in New Orleans means "with lettuce, tomato, and mayonnaise."

Sunday Breakfast: New Orleans Calais, an alternative to Beignets

Since I'm from the New Orleans area, I do indeed love me some beignets.  Those little puffy squares of deep fried dough covered in powdered sugar turn everyone into little kids again, blowing powdered sugar across the table, even unintentionally.  But there are other delicious breakfast treats that have been around even longer and served a purpose, too -- calais!  Also spelled "calas," there are very few places you can find them in New Orleans anymore.  Calais have always been on the menu at The Old Coffee Pot*, though.

Mmmmm ... calais and buttered grits, bless my little southern soul!

Calais are basically fried balls of seasoned rice.  They came into popularity in a time when nothing went to waste.  Every wife and mother saved leftovers (if there were any) of all kinds, and when there was leftover rice**, they made a delicious treat for their husbands who were walking to work and their kids to were walking to school.  During the winter months***, these delicious little treats also served to warm their hands when popped into their pockets.  I'm pretty sure it caused some more work on laundry day, when they had to remove those grease stains from the pockets of their loved ones' clothing, but at least their fingers didn't freeze!

The Old Coffee Pot - yes, you really do want to eat here.
Delicious AND beautiful!

Calais can be eaten alone or as a side, and they are served covered in powdered sugar.  They are so full of flavor, though, that they can overpower the relatively bland eggs and bacon, so I skip all that stuff.  Usually. The Old Coffee Pot offers them with grits, which I looooove, but no one else in my family will touch.  Boooo.  And I just hate cooking in the morning, so these are a very rare treat in my house. Yummy, though!

New Orleans Calais (Rice Balls)

Ingredients:

1 tsp. vanilla
1/4 tsp. salt
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. nutmeg (I actually go a little heavier on this; call it a heaping teaspoon!)
4 tbsp. sugar
6 tbsp. flour
2 eggs
2 cups cooked, cold rice
cooking oil
powdered sugar

Mix the first six ingredients together thoroughly, then mix in the eggs.  Once completely mixed, start adding in the rice, making sure the rice is well-coated.  Heat up a small half-pot of cooking oil (has to be very hot, around 360°) and drop by tablespoons (or, if you have a larger serving spoon, that will make a nice-sized ball, too) gently into the oil.  Depending on the size of your pot, you can probably do about six at a time - more if you're using a larger pot.  Fry the rice balls until they are a dark golden brown.  Remove with a slotted spoon and drain on a cooling rack placed over a couple of paper towels to catch the grease drippings.  Serve hot with powdered sugar.  

*The Old Coffee Pot is located on St. Peter in the French Quarter, right next to Pat O'Brien's.  So after a long night of boozing it up with hurricanes in the courtyard next to the flaming fountain, you can run next door and sober up a bit with some piping hot coffee and delicious calais!

**Turns out, you HAVE to use leftover rice.  Freshly-cooked, hot rice just won't cut it.  It'll make a mushy mess.  Trust me.  Make your rice the night before and store it in the refrigerator overnight.

***Yes, New Orleans has a winter!  It may not snow every year (or every decade), but it is humid all the time and a wet cold is a bone-chilling cold!  We did sometimes end up wearing shorts on Christmas Day, though, so you really can't predict when that cold weather will arrive ... or how long it will stay.

New Orleans Barbecue Shrimp (or BBQ Shrimp, if you prefer)

Wow, I just started this blog today, and I've already got my first request: New Orleans Barbecue Shrimp (or, BBQ shrimp, for you peeps who like abbreviations, LOL, TTYL, BRB).  This is one of my all-time favorite shrimp dishes.  My Aunt Betty made the BEST barbecue shrimp I've ever had, and Deanie's Restaurant in Bucktown (Metairie, Louisiana) came a close second UNTIL the last time I ate there - maybe 2 years ago - and found that they must've changed the recipe for their BBQ shrimp.  And bought smaller cast-iron pans to serve them in.  And got chinchy* with the bread.  And the bread is IMPORTANT, y'all.  Gotta sop up that sauce in the bottom of the pan!

Doesn't that just make your mouth water?

The thing about barbecue shrimp (ahem, BBQ shrimp) is that you have to start with head-on shrimp. It is a MUST.  I had no idea, until my friend Myra (who owns a seafood business with her hubby Denny, you should get your shrimp there: Dennis' Seafood in Metairie, Louisiana) told me about that. And it made all the difference in the world in my own recipe - which is so close to my Aunt Betty's recipe that I would never be able to tell the difference.  I hate to tell you WHY you need the heads**, though.  Just trust me on it.  Go ahead and prep your shrimp by snipping off the pointy little spear on the front of their heads and snip out their eyes while you're at it.  You don't want all those little black beady eyes watching you while you eat their bodies.

I got this feelin' that somebody's watchin' me ...

So here you go:

New Orleans Barbecue Shrimp (BBQ Shrimp)

Ingredients:

7-8 lbs. large shrimp

2 sticks butter

1 cup olive oil

1/2 cup chili sauce

1/4 cup Worcestershire

2 lemons, thinly sliced

4 cloves garlic, minced

4 tbsp. lemon juice

1 tbsp. minced parsley

2 tsp. paprika

2 tsp. oregano

3 tsp. red cayenne pepper

1 tsp. Tabasco

2 tbsp. liquid smoke

salt & pepper to taste

Wash shrimp, prep shrimp, and spread out in a shallow pan.  Combine all of the ingredients above in a saucepan over low heat.  Let simmer for 10 minutes, then pour over the shrimp.  Mix well and refrigerate for 2 to 3 hours.  Baste and turn the shrimp in the fridge every 30 minutes.  Preheat the oven to 300 degrees and bake the shrimp for 30 minutes, turning them at least every 10 minutes. Watch closely -- don't let them overcook, pull them earlier if they're done (they're pink when done).

Serve with chunks of french bread*** to sop up that unbelievably good sauce.  And when all the shrimp are gone, save the leftover sauce and serve it the next night over pasta!

The awesome Vic & Nat'ly Leidenheimer cartoon.  Delicious french bread!

*I've recently discovered that only my New Orleans-area peeps will have heard of "chinchy" before. Chinchy is used to describe someone who is stingy. I don't know how chinchy (or "chincy" as my hubby says) came about, but that's the only word I ever used, until I moved to Texas and got weird looks for it.  

**Okay, okay -- you need to cook the shrimp with the heads on, because during the marinating and cooking process, the fat from the heads leaks out into the sauce making it thicker and rich and delicious.  Get over it, you'll be glad you did.

***Sadly, only my New Orleans-area friends will be able to get the "right" french bread.  Because everywhere else it is sold turns out to be some kind of imposter masquerading as french bread.  If you've never had real french bread, you're probably fine eating whatever passes for it wherever you are.  OR, you could make your own.  I'll post my recipe for it one of these days, somebody remind me of that, okay?

Pumpkin Seeds, the All-Saints Day Treat

Around here, pumpkin seeds are an All-Saints Day treat.*  You know, All-Saints Day, the day after Halloween?  If you're in New Orleans, you traditionally go to the cemetery and clean up your family plot.  Okay, okay, I don't really know anyone who does that anymore.  But I used to be dragged out there as a child.  My grandma used to go buy gladiolus (because she thought they lasted the longest) to arrange in plastic-in-cement vases on the graves of our dearly departed.

To me, these will always be "cemetery flowers"

But I digress ...

Pumpkin seeds.  Pumpkin seeds are a new tradition.  You see, my mom was 46 when I was born, and she was TIRED (note to Mom: I get it now).  The very last thing she wanted to do was (a) carve a pumpkin or (b) figure out how to roast pumpkin seeds.  Yeah, mom wasn't really into cooking.  She made a lot of good stuff, when she felt like it.  Oh, but when she didn't feel like cooking?  Broiled chicken.  We had broiled chicken so often that when my friend Darlene came over one summer day during my high school years and was invited to stay, she actually said, "Sure!  What are we having, broiled chicken?  That's what we eat every time I visit!"  My mom was all pissy over that later, but Darlene did have a point.

I had this so often as a kid, I rarely make it now, though my kids love it.  Oops.

Anyway.  Pumpkin seeds.  When I had kids, I wanted to do all the fun things that my parents were too tired to do with me.  One of the first orders of business was to carve a pumpkin.  My hubby David was shocked that I had never carved a pumpkin.  So he cleaned one out (because I wasn't going to do that, blech, pumpkin guts!) and carved it up into a cheery, smiling pumpkin.  Our baby Drew was about 18 months at the time, and he called it a "popky."  How adorable is that?  He just loved it once it was lit and glowing at him.  Then I had to deal with the popky guts.  Hmmm.

Obligatory cute trick-or-treater pic, circa 2003-ish.

My friend Charlotte (how I miss you, my friend!) had just moved in across the street from us, and was apparently a pro at roasting pumpkin seeds.  She taught me how to clean them up and do a basic salted-pumpkin-seeds recipe. Okay, this is pretty easy, I thought.  It then became my mission to try different pumpkin seed recipes every year -- sweet or savory, didn't matter to me, I tried them all! This year, I went back to basics and made a simple batch of pumpkin seeds with a little kick:

These are were delicious!

Roasted Pumpkin Seeds

Ingredients:

Seeds from one good-sized pumpkin (cleaned of guts and well-drained)
2 tbsp. olive oil (should always be in your pantry, hasn't Rachel Ray taught you anything?!)
2 tbsp. butter (the real stuff, don't use that nasty fake margarine)**
1/2 tsp. freshly-grated sea salt (buy a big container at Sam's, comes with a built-in grater)
1/3 tsp. garlic powder (NOT garlic salt!)
1/4 tsp. Tony Chachere's Creole Seasoning (you should always have this on hand, too)

Preheat oven to 400°.  In a small pot, melt the olive oil and butter together, and then sprinkle in the remaining ingredients (except the seeds) until they are mostly dissolved.  Turn off the heat and pour in the cleaned and drained pumpkin seeds.  Stir until they are well-coated, and then pour onto a pan that you have covered with aluminum foil (no, it isn't necessary to cover the pan, but it does save on clean-up).  Spread them out evenly and pop into the oven, on the middle shelf.  Stir them around every five minutes to ensure even toasting. Stop when they are golden (15-20 minutes).  Carefully lift up the aluminum foil and dump the contents into a wire strainer (to drain the excess olive oil/butter mixture), and once drained, spread the seeds onto a couple of layers of paper towels and sprinkle with some more freshly-grated sea salt.  Serves a family of five.  Or, you know, one, if they others aren't fast enough.

*Everywhere else, I'm sure people enjoy these all during October, too, but here in hotter-than-Hades Texas, we can't carve our pumpkins early, because overnight they start to grow nasty black mold (and no amount of Vaseline stops that, no matter what people tell me) and by Halloween, they are shriveling into truly horrifying blobs.

**I use Plugra, and only Plugra.  It's a European-style butter that costs a little more, but tastes like candy.

Talkin' 'bout My Food Obsession ... !

Okay, so maybe I have a little bit of a food obsession.  I love it.  Almost all of it.  I say "almost" because there are a few things that will never make it into my food obsession.  You know, slimy stuff like snails (even if you call it by a fancy-schmancy name like escargot) and okra and stuff.  But not oysters.  I love oysters.  Especially if they're coated in cornmeal and fried to a crispy crunch on the outside but still bursting with juice from the inside.  Just don't look at 'em once you've bitten one. Eek.

Don't LOOK, I said!  You don't want to KNOW, I said!

Anyway, back to my food obsession.  It sucks, really, because I do NOT have an exercise obsession.  So I try to keep the food obsession under control.  But you know, it's not like smoking -- you can't just quit cold turkey, or at all.  And therein lies my battle.

Ugh.

But that's not really what this blog is going to be about -- not about me and my food issues.  It's going to be about the RESULT of those food issues, which turns out to be a collection of oh-my-god-that-is-really-the-best-thing-i've-ever-eaten recipes that I just can't keep to myself any longer.  I'll be posting both the family recipes that caused my food obsession to begin with and new favorites that literally feed my food obsession.  And I would love to hear from you if you become obsessed, too!