Midnight Snackless

Well, I'm just having fun with all kinds of new stuff. For one thing, I'm discovering that terrific yogurt mustard from yesterday is very versatile, according to the seasoning you mix into it. Today, for instance, I gave it a good shot of lemon-dill seasoning with most excellent results. I also used the last of my red wine vinegar to make this batch so that item went on my shopping list for the next market run.

The other new "stuff" -- new to me, that is -- was learning to poach a chicken breast. I must probably be the last person in the world to poach anything. Don't ask me why. I've just never done it. Not even an egg. Now that I've tried it, I'm thinking, "Gee, how did I manage to miss out on such a neat way of cooking chicken?"

And it is. Earlier this evening I poached one chicken breast in a mixture of water, white wine and assorted spices like onion powder and chipotle and cumin and I don't know what all. It came out tender and juicy and very tasty. Cut it in slices, tossed it with some sliced tomato, topped it with a big glob of the dilled yogurt mustard and served it with a side of rice that had been cooked in tomato-chipotle bouillon. Made for a light but totally satisfying meal. But there is one thing wrong.

I don't have anything left over for my midnight snack.

Oh! Before I forget, John, did you catch the comment from Anonymous after the post about Swaptree? Just in case you missed it -- and that goes for the rest of you on that side of the pond -- go to Read It Swap It. It looks like very much the same sort of setup. Anonymous, whoever (whomever?) you may be, thank you for the tip!

Wild Dominoes

You know how they patiently build those endless lines and patterns of dominoes and when they're done, they tip over just one, which topples all the rest, one by one. A prime illustration of how one durned thang can lead you right along to another. It was sort of like that in my kitchen today. The dominoes I was dealing with were the new Whirley-Pop, a container of Jolly Time popcorn, a bowl of cooked chicken ready to be portioned and frozen, a package of bacon and an avocado.

As I sat sipping my morning coffee, my thoughts strolled leisurely from recalling the ease of using the Whirley-Pop yesterday for the coffee beans to contemplation of using it for its original purpose -- a batch of popcorn. I was also thinking I'd like to fashion another meal out of that chicken before freezing the rest of it. Had myself two burritos yesterday stuffed with spicy rice, chicken and cheese. Something similar might just hit the spot today. Like maybe some chicken patties. Except I didn't want to use a lot of the chicken supply so I'd need an extender like bread cubes. Oops. I don't have any bread. Well, I suppose I could whup out a loaf ...

I mulled this over as I got online and registered the Whirley-Pop. Couldn't help but notice all the popcorn recipes while I was at the site. Which got me to thinking -- instead of using bread cubes as an extender, why couldn't I use popped popcorn? That called for a Google session to see if anyone else had done that. Found lots of recipes where the popped popcorn is whizzed through a blender or food processor until a flour is formed. The result is used in baked goods instead of, or in tandem with, regular flour. But I didn't see anything done the way I was picturing it. Hmmm ... time to call on my inner mad scientist.

By the time I got back to the kitchen, my line of mental dominoes was proliferating at an alarming rate. The first thing I did was to whup up a kettle of popcorn (1/3 cup of kernels, which made around 6 cups of popcorn) and set it aside in a bowl.

Then I took the package of bacon and cut it in half across the strips and baked the half-strips in the FlavorWave. That was a shining success! The grease couldn't drip off of the strips fast enough and the bacon cooked perfectly -- and nicely flat, as well.

While that was going on, I started a batch of bread dough with the idea of making hamburger buns instead of a loaf. Any basic bread recipe will do for this. When the dough cycle is done, divide the dough into 8 parts, shape the buns and lay them on a cookie sheet or jelly roll pan that has been sprinkled with a thin layer of cornmeal. Cover and let rise, then bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes. Gorgeous buns -- and they taste much better than store bought, honest.

The bacon was finished and draining further on paper towels. The dough was doing its thing in the bread machine. Time to have at the chicken. A couple of days ago I boiled the bejaysus out of a whole chicken until it was literally falling off the bones. The result was a lovely bowl of meat that can be used for so many different things it makes one dizzy.

I scooped out enough chicken to measure about 2 cups once it was thoroughly minced to a faretheewell. To that I added about a cup of shredded cheddar and a couple of tablespoons of dry onion flakes. Then I added 1 egg to 1 cup of chicken broth and whisked them together. For seasoning, I wanted to try a tip from the Rachael Ray site. She says if you don't have any smoked paprika, you can make a substitute by mixing 1 tablespoon cumin with 2 teaspoons sweet paprika. So I did. And I scared myself because, without thinking, I put the whole thing in the broth mixture instead of just a portion of it, as I'd intended. Fortunately, the result was wonderful so that goes down in the column under Serendipitous Error.

Now it was time for the "mad" part of the mad scientist experiment. I poured the broth mixture into the chicken mixture and then started working in the popcorn, a couple of cups at a time. Got my hands right into it and started going moosh, moosh, mooshy-moosh. That popcorn slurped up the liquid like a dying man in the desert and it blended itself quite nicely with the other ingredients. I used the whole 6 cups of popcorn. Or maybe it was 7 cups. I'm really not sure of anything except that it all went in before I got the consistency that would allow me to make patties that wouldn't fall apart.

Using an ice cream scoop for portion control, I shaped 8 patties out of the batch. Laid them out on a platter and popped them in the freezer until the buns were ready. That happened all in due course so, while the finished buns were resting with their towel cover, I pulled a couple of the chicken patties out of the freezer to cook. Next time I think they'll do best if they're pan fried with just a touch of olive oil. They're a bit too tender to be laying directly on the wire rack in the FlavorWave, which is how I fixed them this time. It worked out fine but there was a touchy moment there, when I was turning them over to do the other side and thought I was going to lose pieces.

While the patties were cooking, I sliced a couple of buns in half and spread them with chipotle mayonnaise (McCormick makes a really tasty version.) and layered them with avocado slices. The patties fit perfectly on top of the avocado and the bacon settled in place on top of the patties. I cannot TELL you how sublime was the combination of flavors. And nobody would remotely imagine they were eating popcorn.

Well, they wouldn't if I'd made sure there were no unpopped kernels in the chicken mixture. Actually, I was under the mistaken impression that every single kernel had popped but, by golly, I found an "old maid" in the first burger patty. For the record, it was hidden in this one, the one in the closeup below. I think of it as the final domino in the chain.

Wolf in the Hen House

I can only sigh when I look wistfully at that photo. What you see there is currently residing in my very happy tummy and I wish I'd made twice as much. At least.

Wolfie started it. When I dropped in at her place this morning, she was sharing a most excellent recipe with us and if you hit that link, you'll be able to see why Manning, her fireman friend, has won well-deserved fame for his most excellent chicken hot bites.

Now, I didn't have the particular kind of hot sauce Wolfie mentioned but I have some perfectly wonderful Trader Joe's Jalapeno Hot Sauce that, as far as I can tell, worked super-good. So I cut up one breast of chicken (should have done two), shook enough hot sauce over the chicken so that each piece was well coated, then put a lid on the bowl and left it in the fridge for two or three hours.

I don't know what the fish fry batter mix is like but I suspect it's similar to the tempura batter I learned to make years ago, from my Japanese sister-in-law, Betty. If you'll forgive the alliteration, I've never found a better beer batter. Here's all you have to do:

BETTY'S BETTER BEER BATTER
In a small bowl, combine equal parts all purpose flour and corn starch. Add seasoning to taste. I usually use salt, pepper and either garlic powder or onion powder. You can also add just about any kind of spice or herb that seems to fit the occasion. It's your call. Stir all the dry ingredients together well, then crack in one egg and a little bit of beer. Start mixing with a whisk, adding beer as necessary, until you have something the consistency of pancake batter. Not too thick, or you'll end up with yucky, doughy fried food. Not too thin or most of it will run off the food. You don't have to whisk all the lumps out of the batter, surprisingly enough. But you can if you want to. Unless you're making an awful lot of batter, you'll have most of that can or bottle of beer left. That's nice to sip on while you're frying all that tempura over a hot pan of oil.

As you can see, this is a highly flexible recipe. The only hard and fast measurement is the single egg. Just so you'll know, the batter I made today started with 1/3 cup each of flour and corn starch. I knew I wouldn't need much batter but felt that was the least amount I could get by with to balance out the egg. I used Blue Heron pale ale instead of beer and the result was great. There again, use your own judgment. Follow your bliss.

By the way, I'm always reading that one should use room temperature, flat beer for cooking. I don't worry about that. If the beer needs to be warm, I'll nuke it briefly and call it good. Otherwise, it gets used cold and fresh -- which makes for pleasanter sipping of whatever is left over, don'cha know?

I don't know how many pieces of chicken I had. Maybe a couple dozen. Didn't take long to fry them up to golden brown and drain on a paper towel. Then I sat down with the chicken hot bites and a bowl of lemon curd for dipping and figured I'd nibble on, ohhhh -- six or eight, give or take a couple.

Oh my. It was magic. The way every single chicken bite simply vanished. It's not the sort of thing you can stop eating before it's all gone, that's all there is to it. If you make it to share with others, all I can say is you need to get your portion out of the platter right off the git-go and be prepared to guard your plate with weapons of immediate and painful destruction.

Wolfie, thank you for sharing the recipe and please give Manning a grateful hug from me next time you see him. Just so you know, you can hang out at my hen house any time.