Sunday digest

Hey, it's only been 3 weeks! Here's the latest news from around here:

Work/school We are deep into Term 2 and everyone is working hard. DP has started teaching his intensive master's program; I'm trying to help launch a major organizational initiative which is taking a little longer than planned; and Miss B is into her second round of Year 7 electives - which involves cooking!

Last weekend I helped her with her first Food Tech assignment - designing a recipe for and making a salad. I managed to capture a few action shots; here's Miss B chopping celery:

And here's the final result:

Miss B's personal tweaks to the standard salad recipe included chopped salami and pickles - surprisingly delicious, since guess who ended up eating this salad for lunch all week?

Recreation Hanging around our local places playing cards and board games; streaming lots of movies now that we've finally figured out how to work our cable system (it only took 18 months); and indulging Miss B's renewed interest (not to say fangirling) in Doctor Who.

Food Two sets of dinner guests in the space of a couple of days this week meant thinking of ways to be efficient in the kitchen. For the first round, I made my favorite slow cooker chicken recipe, served with potatoes and peas; then, for today's guests, I used the leftover chicken, sauce, and peas as the base of a chicken pot pie:

I rounded out the filling with sauteed bacon, red onion, carrots, and celery, plus a few porcini mushrooms, then stuck it in the oven to heat through and combine. I made a variation on my Emergency Scone recipe for the topping (swapped out sugar for rosemary salt, and some of the cream for olive oil to make it more savory), cooked it separately (I don't like a soggy bottom on my pot pie topping), and slipped it on just before serving. It made a great and frugal late-autumn Sunday lunch (with bread and salad and brownies for dessert) for four adults and three children.

Weather As I may have already mentioned, it's late autumn here: fall foliage, warm days and cold nights, flannel sheets and hot water bottles. And my latest discovery about this season in Australia - native flora are back in season:

 Hope you're having a lovely weekend wherever you are.

Eight weeks (part 1)

That posting-more-often thing doesn't seem to be working out too well, so here comes another mammoth update - so much that it's going to be in 2 parts!

I've developed the habit of baking a loaf of bread on the weekend just to have some around - not because we've got company coming or any other special reason, but just for us. This is what happens when I leave it lying around.

I took some of my first batch of homemade oat cereal and used it as the filling for some homemade chocolates to bring as a hosts' gift. I thought of it as a variation on the Nestle Crunch-type candy bar, but discovered I like the crispy but hefty (and a little bit salty) oats even better.

This is a chicken recipe involving sauteed onions, chicken breasts, and deglazing the pan at the end with balsamic vinegar. I made it in March and I can't remember where I found the original recipe - it was good, though!

Miss B and I have been trying to make time for creative endeavors - we found these alphabet stamps at Miss B's favorite shop.

My first attempt at a salade Niçoise, with a twist - I roasted the potatoes and green beans instead of boiling them, as in the traditional recipe. An excellent dinner salad for those of you where the weather is warming up.

DP's program has students from about two dozen countries besides Australia, and every year they host an International Day festival. I went this year for the first time - here's a picture of, as you can see, the Anglo-American corner.

Continuing the salade Niçoise theme, I made a pan bagnat - a Provençal sandwich - as my contribution to a potluck cards evening with friends. Given the activity, I thought sandwiches were the appropriate food choice, but as it turns out you need two hands to eat this.

And then all of a sudden it was Easter! The usual suspects: tarrale...

...pizza chiena...

...the brunch spread...

...and this year's new addition: an Easter-egg-themed table runner that I made myself out of tea towels.

I liked it so much I moved it onto the kitchen table after Easter was over, and left it there to enjoy for another week or so, along with some leftover goodies.

Speaking of leftover goodies, that brings us to the end of Easter and the end of March. Next up is part 2: the April recap!

Hands off

Hello! Please insert standard apologies for another long silence here, along with reassurance that I thought often, if not every day, of this blog and how I wished I was posting to it. (Not that that made any visible difference, but maybe it gets me some karmic brownie points for good intentions?)

Anyway, here's a snapshot of what I've been up to since Easter, which may help explain my lack of blog-related focus and posting....

A few months ago, we decided spontaneously to organize a fun mini-break at the beach during Miss B's April school holidays, figuring we'd get some lovely mid-autumn weather. Instead, we timed it perfectly to experience the 'storm of the century' which battered Sydney and the surrounding coastal areas for three days, dumping something like 20 cm/12 in of rain in 48 hours on the town where we were staying. Luckily we had brought lots of videos and we never lost power, unlike a lot of other people. We even managed to sneak out onto the beach between storms a few times to admire the moody skies and gigantic, terrifying surf. (Full disclosure: I am quite likely to find Australian surf terrifying even on a regular beach day.)

,

Sometime after we had already booked (and paid for) the abovementioned mini-break, another travel opportunity came along that we couldn't (and decided not to) refuse. The good news was that it meant we got to spend a week in London as a family. The bad news was that it came up at pretty short notice, and required that we fly out of Canberra two days after getting back from the coast. Fun! Well, the getting-there part, not so much; but the being-there part was fun - even the parts like this: wandering in Hyde Park on our first evening, trying desperately to stay awake until bedtime and taking in a few sights along the way. Other highlights of the week included taking Miss B to my favorite British museum, the V&A, for the first time (a success) and attempting to take her into a pub to meet some of my colleagues (a failure - they chucked us out on account of no children being allowed in after 5pm!).

Part of the reason that the London trip came together is that I was already scheduled to fly to Europe - when the week was over, DP and Miss B flew back to Australia, while I went on to Greece for a week-plus of work meetings. (Yes, my job is very gruelling.) Here's a view of one of many glorious sunsets I witnessed with the Parthenon looming picturesquely in the middle distance.

Needless to say, with all the travelling and other stuff going on, I haven't done a huge amout of cooking in the last several weeks (although I did eat some pretty amazing food in Greece, particularly at this place down the street from my hotel, where I think I ended up eating at least one meal every day that I was in Athens). But I have still found the time to become enamored of two things new to my kitchen:

1. Fried toast. Inspired by this post on food52, this has become my go-to vehicle for gussying up leftovers. The photo above may not look particularly earth-shattering (have I mentioned winter is coming in Canberra, which means no more natural light for dinner photos for a while?), but any kind of sliced bread fried in a pond of olive oil is the perfect carrier for anything involving sauce or gravy. Also stupendous at breakfast time (and a dramatic improvement on fried bread, which honestly I never saw the point of, probably because there wasn't nearly enough olive oil involved).

2. Hands-off dinners. (Ah, we come to the point of the post name at last! Did you think I was referring to the multiple-week silence here? Let's call it a pun.) I've been doing some experimenting lately with the whole roasting-pan-dinner concept - as in, you put a bunch of stuff in a roasting pan and put it in the oven, and when you take it out, that's dinner. I'm not sure why I haven't picked up on this concept sooner, especially given how long I've been cooking dinner, but I'm kind of loving it, especially on school nights. This is a current favorite (again with the crappy pictures): chop up some carrots and potatoes and toss with olive oil and seasonings, then place in a roasting pan and stick in the oven at about 375F/190C. While those get going, prep these devilled chicken pieces (the original recipe calls for legs, but I use drumsticks) and add to the roasting pan. Roast the whole business for 30-45 minutes (giving you time to clean up the kitchen, supervise homework, maybe answer a few emails from your boss who just came online overseas - oh wait, maybe that's just me), or until everything is cooked to your liking, hopefully with some brown crusty bits here and there.

And that's the news update from here. Hope all is well wherever you are?

Chicken twofer redux

Is it time for coffee break yet?

I didn't manage to take a single picture of anything food-related this week. Probably because I didn't do much cooking. Unlike last week, I didn't have to host or prep any special meals or anything. D was even out a couple of nights, so Miss B and I concentrated on taking care of the leftovers amassed earlier.
My favorite of these was a concoction involving the leftovers from the dinner I had hosted for three rather distinguished visitors. (Definitely teapot people!) For the dinner, I had prepared a recipe from Mark and Bruce's Great American Slow Cooker Book, which involved shredding a bunch of carrots and onions, mixing them with seasonings, balsamic, and worcestershire sauce (I think), and then making them into a sort of chicken bed in the bottom of a slow cooker. On top go multiple chicken breasts, topped with sage leaves and then wrapped in prosciutto, to cook for about 4 hours.

This made for a tasty and, dare I say, elegant main course - very streamlined but still flavorful. I served it with roasted potatoes, a green salad, and homemade bread. We started with some kind of creamy dip and finished with a peach-blueberry galette, and everyone went home happy (as well as, in at least one case, reeling with jet lag).

Where the chicken dish really outdid itself, however, was as leftovers. A couple of days later, I had a packed schedule, and (unusually for me) knew I'd be out of the house from before 9 until after 5. First thing in the morning, while I was doing breakfast and lunch prep, I also chopped up the leftover chicken breasts and put them back in the slow cooker, along with the carrot/onion mix and a bottle of tomato passata. I stirred everything together and left it to cook on low for the day. When we were nearly ready for dinner that night, I went in there with a potato masher to make sure the chicken was falling apart and mixed in (it was); then threw in a package of gnocchi and a handful of grated parmigiano-reggiano. I left that to heat through for about 15 minutes, topped it with a generous dusting of grated pecorino romano, and dinner was served.

This was a smash hit - starchy and comforting but also very savory and hearty. Miss B, who has mixed feelings about gnocchi (mainly due to my habit of toasting them in the oven until crispy for certain dishes), ate this with gusto and took the leftovers to school for lunch more than once. This is another chicken slow cooker dish that I'll be cooking at least as much for the leftovers as for the main event (coming a close second to this one).

Unfortunately I didn't remember to take a picture of it, so instead you get a goofy picture of a t-rex trying to fold a pair of jeans. (Why? Enquiring minds want to know.) However, I am doing some cooking today, of which I promise to take pictures for an update in the near future.

Chicken twofer

My friends, I have an important announcement to make: I think I've finally found a slow cooker chicken recipe that I'll make more than once. After years of trying, and numerous mediocre chicken recipes, none of which have been deemed worthy of inclusion (or even a mention) here, I think I've got a keeper.

I got the idea for this out of an Australian Women's Weekly seasonal cookbook that I picked up in a secondhand bookstore a few weeks ago and have been carrying around with me obsessively ever since. Or, to be more accurate, I got the main ingredient combo from there, and then the rest of it just evolved.

Slow cooker chicken with leeks and bacon
Since I didn't actually follow a recipe, I've just documented the procedure that I used. Note that most slow cooker chicken recipes don't recommend cooking the chicken for more than about 4 hours, or else it starts to dry out. I cooked this for 4 hours on low, and the texture was excellent.

1. Turn on the slow cooker to start heating. (I usually turn mine on high to get going and then turn to low after about 30-45 minutes.) Put a medium-sized cast-iron skillet to heat on the stove over low-medium heat, and add 2 Tbsp olive oil to warm up. Add 1 anchovy to oil.
2. Chop up 4 pieces of good-quality bacon and add to skillet. Wash, remove the green top of, and slice 1 leek and add to bacon.
3. Cook mixture in skillet, stirring regularly, for about 5 minutes, until bacon begins to crisp and leek to soften and brown.
4. While mixture in skillet is cooking, sprinkle about 1/2 cup (2 oz/60 g) flour into a shallow bowl, and season with salt and cayenne pepper. Dredge 4-6 chicken thighs in seasoned flour, turning to coat with flour on all sides.
5. Dump contents of skillet in slow cooker, leaving some bacon fat behind. Stuff leek top along with 2 sprigs rosemary into a cheesecloth bag, popsock, or similar, and add to slow cooker also.
6. Put skillet back on burner and add chicken thighs to brown. Cook 3-5 minutes, until beginning to brown, then turn and repeat on the other side. (You may want to use a splatter screen here.)
7. When chicken is browned on both sides, remove from skillet and lay in the slow cooker. 
8. Return skillet to burner and sprinkle in about 2 Tbsp of the seasoned dredging flour. Stir into the fat in the pan until you have a basic roux. 
9. Pour about 1 cup white wine into the skillet. Heat the wine, stirring constantly with a whisk, and use it to deglaze the skillet.
10. Empty the skillet into the slow cooker and decide if you need any additional liquid. (Chicken should be at least halfway submerged in the liquid.) If so, pour hot water from the kettle into the skillet and scrape up any remaining bits. Pour into the slow cooker.
11. Give the contents of the slow cooker a good stir, cover, and leave alone for 3-4 hours.
12. Before serving, taste sauce and adjust seasonings. (I added a bit of salt and pepper, and a scoop of Greek yoghurt to balance out the flavors in the sauce.)
13. I served this with Italian baked potatoes with oil and a green vegetable.

And the twofer part? You can see that in the photo above. The next night, I warmed up the leftovers (one chicken thigh, chopped up, and a couple cups of chunky sauce) and served them mixed into gnocchi and sauteed kale for a speedy dinner that was just as good as the original. Next time I make this (and there will be a next time), I'll make sure there's enough to do this part again too.

Saturday digest

Cooking chocolate from Germany - food souvenirs are the best kind

How can it be the beginning of June already? Here’s the roundup of the latest doings round here.

Work/school Term 2 is nearly half over, and Miss B is trucking along happily. (Bouncing along might be more accurate in her case.) The other week she had her first experience of full-blown standardized testing, taking the NAPLAN along with every other Year 3 student in Australia. Her school did their best to make it a non-stressful experience, but I for one am glad it’s two years until the next round. DP, who promised us his workload would ease up somewhat around this time, has been as good as his word and has been sighted at home on the occasional weekday between the hours of 7am and 6pm. I’ve had a fairly quiet week – not one nighttime conference call! – but my To Do list remains chronically overstuffed. I did record a significant milestone earlier this month: my organization’s Twitter account, which I manage, hit 20,000 followers, a little more than four years (and nearly 3,000 tweets!) since we first joined up. So I’m pretty pleased with that.

Recreation The big news is that this week we booked tickets for our trip to North America later this year, which involved sorting out a fairly complicated itinerary and then spending 2.5 hours working through it with a travel agent (after both DP and I crashed the Qantas website trying to do it ourselves). But it all looked right at the end and we should be good to go (fingers crossed). Other than that, Miss B has been having a steady stream of afterschool playdates, and I’ve been plowing through this month’s book club selection: Cloudstreet by Tim Winton, widely hailed as a ‘modern Australian classic.’ The jury is still out on that, but it’s definitely educational for a non-Australian. More to come when I finish, perhaps.

Food Shorter days and colder nights have meant lots of familiar, rib-sticking comfort foods lately: 

• oatmeal for breakfast at least twice a week (savory oatmeal, that is)
  
• the disruptive bolognese sauce continues to prove its worth - and the longer you cook it, the better it gets
  
• lemon-mustard chicken remains a reliable workhorse in my recipe rotation; one of the first things I learned to cook on my own, and still going strong
  
• I found curly kale at the farmers’ market for the first time in nearly a year! So it’s back to a steady supply of kale salad
  
• and an old favorite – Nigella Lawson’s Dense Chocolate Loaf Cake (known around here as Brownie Cake) - which I was reminded of recently and have made twice in the past two weeks in response to demand (apparently it’s the best thing for morning tea ever)

Weather Cold, grey and wet this weekend; described by a fellow transplant to Canberra as ‘fabulously miserable’.

Miss B’s Quote of the Week During a conversation about jellyfish:

Miss B: So why does it hurt when they sting you?

RL: Well, they must release some kind of chemical when they touch you that makes your skin hurt.

Miss B (obviously finding this explanation similar to another one I had provided recently): Oh, so they’re like the onions of the ocean!

How are your onions?

 

Winner winner

The other night I made a roast chicken for dinner; as we ate, Miss B asked about the crispy brown stuff on the side of my plate.

“That’s the skin,” I informed her, then confided, “You know what? That’s about 75% of the reason I make roast chicken – so I can eat the skin.”

She looked up at me, eyes round with surprise. “Really?”

“Yup,” I confirmed. “It’s crispy and salty and delicious. Wanna try some?”

She peered at it for a minute with interest, but then her native caution about new food won out. “Um…no thanks.”

On the inside, I had one of those Parenting Moments We Don’t Talk About – an internal response equal parts shrieking “Just try it, fer crying out loud!!!” and teasing “Well, more for me then!”. On the outside, I remained an adult, shrugged, and said, “Okay.”

Then the subject changed, so we didn’t talk about the other 25% of the reason I make roast chicken: because, in addition to being delicious, it provides the basis for at least another two meals. This particular bird has now been stripped and reincarnated as 1) chicken pot pie with a biscuit crust (also incorporating the leftover medley of carrots/celery/onions that I threw in the roasting pan under the chicken, as well as the pan juices it produced while cooking) and 2) chunky chicken salad. When down to nude bones, it went on to 3) simmer gently in a pot with water and vegetables to produce chicken stock for use in yet another dinner (soup? risotto? it all depends on what’s happening next week).

Chicken pot pie

This, along with cottage pie, is at the top of the list of things I only ever make when I have leftovers from a roast dinner. (It's not really a recipe, but rather an attractive repackaging of things you’ve already cooked.) I start by stripping as much chicken meat off the carcass as I can and chopping it into bite-sized pieces, and then look at it against the amount of vegetables I have available. Then, depending upon the number of people I’m feeding, I either subtract some chicken for another use, or boost the amount of vegetables with something easy, like frozen peas. If I have sufficient cooking liquid, or have made gravy, I add that in, and mix everything together in a good-sized bowl. If I don’t have enough liquid, I augment it by making a quick roux, dumping in whatever liquid I do have, and bolstering it with whatever stock I have around or, in a pinch, water. Once all this is mixed together and placed in a suitable baking dish, it can be topped with a sheet of frozen puff or shortcrust pastry, should you have one stashed away; or you can make a quick biscuit crust using a recipe like this one (minus the fruit and sugar). Put in a 180C/350F oven to heat through and cook the crust (about 30 minutes), and dinner is served.

PS Given the name of this post, I was compelled to Google the origins of the phrase "Winner winner, chicken dinner." The most commonly offered explanation I found was that, once upon a time, a free chicken dinner was one of the prizes offered to gamblers in Las Vegas. (I make no claims about its plausibility or accuracy.)