Ultimate Comfort Food... Chicken & Dumplings

I never thought dumplings sounded good at all until my sis-in-law Sara made this yummy Food Network recipe when they were back for a visit. Credit goes to Tyler Florence for this one. These dumplings were light, and fluffy, and so, so good... it was hard not to bend over and stick my whole face in the bowl. I'm a little late with publishing this because it was super cold and wintery when I made it back in January, but it's snowing today - on April 15 - my car is in the shop so I can't go anywhere, so I kind of wish we were having this for dinner tonight.

There are 4 parts to this recipe, so plan to make it when you have nothing else to do all day. If you find it too labor intensive you can cut some corners by using a store-bought rotisserie chicken and you can buy cartons of chicken stock in the store, but trust me when I say the effort of making everything from scratch is so, so worth it.

I will list the ingredients and instructions for each part, and then give you a complete shopping list at the end.

Roasted Chicken

1 (3 pound) whole chicken
4 ounces unsalted butter, softened (I only had salted butter and it was fine.)
1 lemon halved and juiced, halves reserved
1/4 cup fresh chopped herbs, such as rosemary, thyme and parsley
1 onion, halved
4 garlic cloves, smashed
Fresh whole herbs, such as rosemary, thyme and parsley sprigs
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Preheat oven to 375F. Remove the neck and giblets from the cavity of the chicken and discard. (Really? I saved them and threw them in the pot when I made the stock.) Rinse the chicken under cold water, inside and out. Pat dry thoroughly with paper towels.



In a small bowl, mash together the softened butter, lemon juice, and chopped herbs. I had a hard time getting the juice to mix with the butter, so make sure your butter is really soft and the juice is slightly warm.



Rub the herbed butter all over the chicken, as well as under the skin. Stuff the lemon halves, onion, garlic, and whole herbs inside the chicken cavity.

Tie the legs together with kitchen twine. (I skipped this step because after I stuffed everything inside I couldn't get the legs together, so don't worry if you can't do it either.) Okay, those of you with vivid imaginations - stop it. Place the chicken, breast side up, in a roasting pan fitted with a rack. I didn't have a rack, so don't worry about that either, it doesn't make that much difference in the end. Here's what mine looked like before I put it in the oven:



Roast for 1 hour until the meat is no longer pink. Try your best to resist diging in to this gorgeous, delicious bird at this point, because it will be really tempting. Don't do it.




When cool enough to handle, shred the meat, discarding the skin and set aside. (Again, I don't know why you would throw the skin away when you could use it in the stock.. I did.) Reserve the bones for the stock.

Chicken Stock

2 Tablespoons olive oil
2 carrots, cut in large chunks
2 celery stalks, cut in large chunks
1 onion, halved
1 garlic bulb, halved (cut it in half horizontally across the center)
Reserved chicken bones (throw in the skin and giblets)
2 quarts cold water
4 sprigs fresh parsley
4 sprigs fresh thyme
2 bay leaves

Coat a large stockpot with the olive oil and place over medium heat. Add the carrots, celery, onion and garlic halves and saute for 3 minutes.



Add the reserved chicken bones, water, and herbs; simmer for 1 hour.



Strain the stock to remove the solids and set aside.




Dumplings

2 cups flour
1 Tablespoon baking powder (that isn't a typo, you really do need a full Tablespoon)
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
3/4 - 1 cup buttermilk

Sift dry ingredients together in a large bowl. In a small bowl, lightly beat the eggs and buttermilk together; pour the liquid into the dry ingredients and gently fold. I did this wrong - I put everything into the bowl and then mixed it. I've done it both ways, and the dumplings turned out just as good either way.



Mix just until the dough comes together, the batter should be thick and cake-like.




Supreme Sauce

2 Tablespoons butter
1 Tablespoon oil
1 Tablespoon salt
1/4 cup + 1 Tablespoon flour
1/2 cup diced carrots
1/2 cup diced celery
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 bay leaves
6 cups chicken stock
1/4 cup heavy cream
Freshly ground black pepper for garnish
Chopped flat-leaf parsley for garnish

This is where the whole dish comes together.



In a Dutch oven, melt the butter and oil over medium heat. Add the celery, carrots, garlic and bay leaves.



Saute until the veggies are soft, about 5 minutes.



Stir in the flour to make a roux. Continue to stir and cook for 2 minutes to coat the flour and remove the starchy taste.



Slowly pour in the chicken stock, 1 cup at a time, stirring well after each addition.
Let simmer until the sauce is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon, about 15 minutes. Stir in heavy cream. Don't panic if your sauce seems runny, it is not supposed to be very thick.



Fold in the shredded chicken into the sauce and bring up to a simmer. Using 2 spoons, carefully drop heaping tablespoonfuls of the dumpling batter into the hot mixture. The dumplings should cover the top of the sauce, but should not be touching or crowded. Mine are a little crowded because there was more dough than there was room in my very large Dutch oven, and I didn't want to throw it out.



Let the dumplings poach for 10-15 minutes until they are firm and puffy. This is why you don't want to crowd the dumplings. They really do puff up and turn out really light and fluffy.




Season with the pepper if you like and garnish with chopped parsley before serving. If you are not a fan of black pepper like me, stop by Penzey's and pick up some of their 4-color peppercorns. They have great flavor but don't burn your mouth. This serves 6 people, and the leftovers are still good heated up the next day.

Yum!




Shopping List

1 3-lb whole chicken
salt
pepper
butter
1 lemon
2 whole bulbs garlic
olive oil
vegetable/canola oil
carrots
celery
2 onions
4 bay leaves
flour
2 eggs
1 c. buttermilk
1/4 cup heavy cream

Rosemary Chicken Fried Chicken

In between all the holiday goodies we still need to eat real food. I've been on kind of a chicken kick lately, so tonight I made my own version of Chicken Fried Chicken. Yes, I actually thought of a recipe all by myself! What sets this apart from your everyday chicken fried chicken is that I use Rosemary flavored crackers for the crust.

Carr's Rosemary crackers:



You could use any kind of crackers you like, but I love the Rosemary crackers because they perfectly compliment the chicken. The only other seasoning I add is a little salt and pepper on the chicken before I coat it.

Here's what you will need to make this:


Tenderized chicken breasts

1 box Carr's Rosemary crackers

1 cup flour

2 eggs, beaten with a tablespoon of water added

salt and pepper

Oil for frying (I use Canola oil)


Crush the crackers in a ziploc bag using a rolling pin. See how pretty they are with those little bits of Rosemary? Can you even see the little bits of Rosemary? Trust me, they are there. The crackers look and smell so good I almost hate to destroy them.



Crush the crackers as finely as you can. Turn the bag over and crush them some more. Think about someone who made you mad today, it's more satisfying that way. They should look something like this:



Prepare your flour and egg wash. I used 1 cup of flour for the two chicken breasts I used. Adjust the amount as needed depending on how much you are making. Beat the eggs and water together in a separate pan. Heat the oil while you are prepping the chicken. Did you notice the white stuff in the pan of oil? It's true, I confess... I snuck a few pats of butter into the oil. Because I'm sneaky like that. Call it stealth butter.



Lightly salt and pepper your chicken. You don't need very much because the crackers are salted, but this is your only chance to season the chicken. I bought this chicken already tenderized and pre-packaged at my HyVee store, but if that's not available you can ask them to tenderize for you or do it yourself if you like to beat your food into submission. These are bigger than they look, one is more than enough for two people. I made two, but they are great as leftovers, they are even good cold. I'm guessing it will take us about 3 days to eat this.



Dredge the seasoned chicken in the flour and shake off the excess. Next, dip it in the egg wash. The flour helps the egg wash stick, and together they will act like a "glue" that will hold the cracker crumbs on the chicken, giving you a beautiful, thick, yummy crust. Dip it into the cracker crumbs last, making sure every bit of the chicken is coated and then shake off the excess crumbs. Place it in the hot oil and stand back while magic happens. If your pieces are big like these, cook them one at a time. Crowded food doesn't brown as well.



When the first side is nicely browned, very carefully turn it over. You might even want to cut the pieces in half to make them easier to work with. Just be careful that you don't splash the hot oil all over the place.



When the second side is browned (it won't take as long as the first side) carefully remove from the pan and place on a paper towel lined plate to drain the excess oil. When this is on the plate you can really appreciate how big these are. They didn't look that big when I bought them, but by the time you do the crust they are huge!



Serve with your favorite veggies and dig in!

Now... back to the cookies.

Chicken Piccata

One of the perks of my job as a nurse practitioner is that I get to have lunch in the medical staff dining room on weekdays. They set up a decent salad bar, and several choices of hot dishes and sides.. I won't mention the desserts, because today I want to take a break from all the sweetness that abounds during this time of year. Besides, I need to leave that stuff alone anyway! Unfortunately, it's still "hospital food", and the Chicken Piccata I had yesterday left me really hungry for Chicken Piccata made somewhere other than the hospital kitchen. The hospital version was certainly edible, but the flour coating was falling off in big, sticky sheets, I had to use my imagination to appreciate much in the way of lemon flavor, and I think mine had all of 3 capers on it. I shouldn't complain though, because I could have been eating cafeteria food, and I'm guessing they probably weren't serving Chicken Piccata in the cafeteria.

Chicken Piccata is a really simple dish to make, so I don't know why I haven't tried it at home before. It's really just a tenderized chicken breast simmered in a simple lemony sauce made with either chicken stock or white wine, and some capers.

Capers are what make it special, I think. I love that piquant burst of flavor that fills your mouth when you bite into them. Capers are the immature flower buds of a perennial plant which is native to the Mediterranean and some parts of Asia. After harvesting, the buds are dried in the sun and then pickled in a brine made with vinegar or wine. The ones I used were packaged in balsamic vinegar. Yum! You can find capers in the grocery store next to the pickles and olives.



When it came down to searching for the perfect recipe, I just did a Google search for Chicken Piccata, and got a whole list of sites. This is really because I was too lazy to search through all my cookbooks. I looked at several of them - myrecipes.com, simplyrecipes.com, epicurious.com, squidoo.com to name a few... there are more. The one I settled on, though, came from one of my favorite Food Network stars, Giada De Laurentiis on foodnetwork.com. I liked her recipe the best because it used basic ingredients and looked easy to make. I have 3 of Giada's cookbooks, and her Turkey Meatballs with Marinara Sauce is a staple at my house. Next time I make a batch I will be sure and share it with you! And yes it's true, I was even too lazy to look through my Giada cookbooks.

I keep trying to post links, but for some reason they don't show up in the finished post, so if any of you have any helpful hints for me I would love to hear from you!


Giada's Chicken Piccata

2 skinless and boneless chicken breasts, butterflied and then cut in half

Sea salt (regular salt is fine here) and freshly ground black pepper (or not)

All-purpose flour, for dredging

6 tablespoons unsalted butter

5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1/3 cup fresh lemon juice

1/2 cup chicken stock

1/4 cup brined capers, rinsed

1/3 cup fresh parsley, chopped (or just stick a sprig or two on the side like I did)

You can see here that I already strayed from the recipe in that I had the cute guy behind the meat counter run a couple of chicken breasts through the tenderizer for me. When you use tenderized chicken, you can cut the finished dish with a fork.



Season chicken with salt and pepper. Dredge chicken in flour and shake off excess.

In a large skillet over medium high heat, melt 2 tablespoons of butter with 3 tablespoons olive oil.

Seriously now, did you think I was really going to measure my oil and butter? For me, it was more like a couple of turns of EVOO (oops, wrong show...) and cut off a few good sized chunks of butter.



When butter and oil start to sizzle, add 2 pieces of chicken and cook for 3 minutes. I only made 2 pieces, so that was easy. (It's okay if you don't time this, just cook it until it is a nice golden brown)



Looking good!



When chicken is browned, flip and cook other side for 3 minutes. Remove and transfer to plate.

Melt 2 more tablespoons butter and add another 2 tablespoons olive oil.

When butter and oil start to sizzle, add the other 2 pieces of chicken and brown both sides in same manner. Remove pan from heat, then remove chicken from pan and set aside on a plate.




Into the pan add the lemon juice, stock and capers.

I used these cute little Meyer lemons I got at Whole Foods.



Return to stove and bring to boil, scraping up brown bits from the pan for extra flavor. Check for seasoning. Return all the chicken to the pan and simmer for 5 minutes.



Remove chicken to platter. Add remaining 2 tablespoons butter to sauce and whisk vigorously. Pour sauce over chicken and garnish with parsley. I thought a couple of lemon slices made it look even more festive.



As you can see, I strayed from the recipe yet again and got a little carried away with the capers. I used the whole jar. I was feeling deprived. It was a bit much, but I think if I had made 4 pieces of chicken like Giada did, it might have been okay. I do have to admit that my husband made a snide remark today about not putting any lemon on his food... so I guess he wasn't a fan. *sigh* Oh well, that's what I get for marrying a regular meat and potatoes guy. This chicken would be darn good even without the sauce, so next time there will just be more lemony goodness for me!


If the link below is not clickable, just copy and paste into your browser window. Enjoy!

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/giada-de-laurentiis/chicken-piccata-recipe2/index.html