November 24th: chicken pot pie and chocolate toffee walnut cookies

Two to-die-for recipes!


For supper, from the keeper book: Chicken Pot Pie. I pulled this recipe out of the Ottawa Citizen a few years ago; it is from a local restaurant. Take a cheap cut of chicken, poach it, use that broth to cook the veggies, use the same broth to make a white sauce, mix it all up in a pie pan and top with - my favourite - puff pastry. Bake, relax, and enjoy, enjoy, enjoy. I think even your picky eaters will like this one. My kid loooooves it. As does my husband. And moi.


Chicken Pot Pie


1 1/2 lbs (675 g) chicken pieces with skin and bones
1 tsp (5 mL) salt, divided
freshly ground black pepper
2 medium carrots, scrubbed and sliced
1 small onion, chopped
2 medium potatoes, diced
1/4 cup (50 mL) butter
4 tbsp (65 mL) all-purpose flour
1/4 cup (50 mL) 35% cream
salt and pepper to taste
1 tbsp (15 mL) lemon juice
1/2 397-g pkg frozen puff pastry, defrosted


Place chicken pieces in a medium saucepan, cover with water and bring to a boil. Skim and add 1/2 tsp (2 mL) salt and a pinch of freshly ground black pepper. Reduce heat and simmer, partially covered, 30 minutes.


Preheat oven to 400°F (200°C). Strain chicken, reserving the broth. Measure the broth and add water, if necessary, to equal 1 1/2 cups (375 mL). Place the liquid in the saucepan, add vegetables and simmer, partially covered, until just tender. Strain, reserving the stock.


While vegetables are cooking, debone and skin the chicken. Cut the meat into bite-size pieces. Combine meat with cooked vegetables in a 9" (23 cm) pie plate or individual oven-proof dishes.


Melt butter gently in saucepan. Gradually stir in flour, blending well. Cook over medium heat 1 minute, stirring constantly. Slowly add cream and cook until mixture is smooth and thick. Add salt, pepper to taste, lemon juice and reserved stock. Blend well and pour sauce over the chicken mixture.


Roll out defrosted puff pastry to 1/4" (6 mm) thickness, then lay pastry over pie(s) and press to the dish(es). Cut a slit in the centre to allow steam to escape. Bake until filling is bubbling and crust is golden brown, about 25 minutes (less for small pies).


Serves 4.

I enjoy this photo because it appears I just piled the food on the glass stovetop.

For my Christmas cookie exchange - finally, a winner! - from epicurious: Chocolate Toffee Walnut Cookies. These are ridiculously awesome. The recipe suggests making 1/4 cup-sized cookies, which I think is over-indulgence (though probably an edible size!) so I made generous tablespoonful-sized cookies, which are plenty big and chewy and decadent enough. I used chocolate chips where it called for chopped chocolate, and Scor bars where it called for Heath. I managed to make 4 dozen cookies with one recipe, and note that the recipe only calls for 1/2 cup of flour. These are chocolate heaven. I will definitely be making these again.

September 18th: steak and mushroom pot pie

My favourite meal of all time - the one I would request on my deathbed - is my mom's steak and mushroom pie, with puff pastry crust. Only, on my deathbed, I would have it all to myself, because there is never enough to go around. I didn't quite recreate this tonight, but I made a variation on it, and it turned out pretty well. We three were impressed. In my case, rather than using a good quality steak, quickly cooked, I had pulled some stewing beef out of the freezer, so I got that simmering and left it for an hour while I napped, then went back to the kitchen and proceeded to make the rest of the recipe. I had intended to put both carrots and potatoes in the pie too, but I was tired after spending the night before with friends from out of town, then getting up to teach a class in the morning and finally heading out of town for a baby shower, so I ended up going simple and the pie was filled with just beef and mushrooms, with a touch of onion and garlic. I could eat mushrooms till the cows come home and it tasted great ... though more veggies would have upped the filling-ness of it, as well as the health quotient. Ah well, here is what I came up with:


Steak and Mushroom Pot Pie - long-cooking variation


canola oil
1 lb stewing beef, cut into bite-sized pieces
freshly ground black pepper
2 cups beef stock
1 bay leaf


[options to add potatoes and carrots here! - 1-2 of each]


1 cup diced onions
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 pound mushrooms, any variety, chopped


1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
2 tbsp all-purpose flour


1/2 397 g package frozen puff pastry, thawed


1 egg, beaten (optional)


Heat the canola oil in a Dutch oven over medium heat. When hot, add beef and season to taste with pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, until liquid evaporates, 10-15 minutes. When pan is starting to dry out, pour in stock and add bay leaf. Bring to a boil over high heat, then reduce heat to low, cover and simmer for at least one hour. Nap if necessary.

[If using potatoes and carrots, chop them and add them to the pot at the end of the hour, simmering until just cooked, 10-15 minutes.]

Using a slotted spoon, remove meat [and any veggies] to a bowl and set aside. Pour liquid into a 2-cup measuring cup and set aside. Return Dutch oven to stovetop, increase heat to medium, and add canola oil.

When hot, add diced onions, and cook, stirring frequently, until onions soften, 4-5 minutes. If onions start to burn, reduce heat. Add minced garlic and stir for 1 more minute. Add mushrooms and cook, stirring frequently, another 5 minutes. Then stir in Worcestershire sauce. Sprinkle flour over mixture and stir frequently for 2 minutes.

Meanwhile, add enough water to the measuring cup to bring the liquid amount back to 2 cups. Add all of liquid to pot, stirring to deglaze pot. Return meat and vegetables to pot and simmer gently.

Preheat oven to 400°F. Roll out puff pastry to 1/4-inch thickness. When oven is hot, remove bay leaf from pot and pour pie filling into an 8-inch square baking dish. Place puff pastry overtop, covering to sides, and folding or crimping sides in as necessary. Slice vent(s) in centre of crust to allow steam to escape. If desired, brush pastry with egg.

Bake in preheated oven for 25-30 minutes, until top is golden and puffed and filling is bubbling. Remove from oven, let stand several minutes, then slice and serve.

Makes 4 servings, unless you are on your deathbed, in which case, enjoy the whole dish yourself!

March 7th: sausage and egg puff pastry pie

Have you ever wondered what that picture at the top of my blog home page is? Tonight, I retried this one, from February 2010's Today's Parent: sausage and egg puff pastry pie.

I find it a little meat heavy, and I'm thinking of trying it again, leaving out the ham, taking away one of the sausages, and adding in some onion and diced sweet pepper. I made it this time around with pre-rolled puff pastry, which I don't think is quite as good, but does save a few minutes.


When I made it last year in February, it turned out so beautifully I simply had to take pictures. Now, looking back, that lovely picture up there was taken before the plate (and all my other plates!) acquired chips along its side. I need to invest in some good quality plates that won't chip. Add it to the list!

February 11th: shrimp vol-au-vents

Friday night and I am teaching a class at a club in Kanata: a half hour drive on a regular night, up to an hour and a half on game night. Tonight, happily, there was no game. Since I started teaching this class in January, we've worked out a routine where I teach, Greg takes the class and Olivia stays home with a babysitter. Food for O and babysitter needs to be provided and ideally, we would like to eat too, before or after class, or both. The last few weeks we've been doing take out because Fridays get to be too busy and we can't find time to prepare something. Today, after spending the week eating out in Edmonton, I really wanted to cook, so set aside some time. For the girls, I made a salad and pinwheel peanut butter and jam sandwiches. When we got home from the gym, and after putting O to bed, we finished off the salad and I cooked up some shrimp vol-au-vents. I got the idea for this one from an LCBO flyer, although I simplified it a bit. Weirdly, the LCBO website has a completely different recipe for this than the one I made. Anyway, we decided to toss the recipe, as it was too rich with cream and oil and puff pastry. Good, but too much.

We finished the night by watching Never Let Me Go, which was depressing as all get out, but really good. It's been stuck in my head all weekend.

January 29th: applesauce cake, pork tenderloin en croûte

Winners all around today. All my Saturday plans were cancelled, which meant I had a lazy day to spend at home. It's been awhile and I've been wanting one. Lazy means doing load after load of laundry, of course. O and I spent our Saturday morning making applesauce cake, a recipe I pulled out of the Ottawa Citizen in November 2009. I had originally planned to make it for O's birthday in 2010, but didn't, and then this year, when I asked her whether she wanted apple, carrot or chocolate cake for her birthday, surprise, surprise, she chose chocolate. Of course, on the day of, after her cake was made, she told me she wanted strawberry cake. Too little, too late, my dear.


So, applesauce cake. This recipe makes two loaf pan cakes, and I though it might be more like an applesauce loaf, but oh no, this is cake all the way, and it is delicious. Between the three of us (mostly me and O), we ate almost one whole cake over the course of the day. Really, really good. We'll definitely try this one again.

Applesauce Cake

3/4 cup (175 mL) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups (375 mL) sugar
3 eggs
2 cups (500 mL) all-purpose flour, sifted
3/4 cup (175 mL) whole wheat flour*
1 1/2 tsps (7 mL) salt
1 1/2 tsps (7 mL) baking powder
1/2 tsp (2 mL) baking soda
1/2 tsp (2 mL) nutmeg
1/2 tsp (2 mL) cinnamon
114-oz (398 mL) unsweetened applesauce**
3/4 cup (175 mL) chopped walnuts, optional***

Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C).

Cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Blend in eggs.

In a separate bowl, sift together the dry ingredients. Add to creamed mixture, alternating with applesauce, beating after each addition. If you like, stir in walnuts. Divide batter between 2 greased loaf pans.

Bake for one hour or until done (start checking at the 50 minute mark). Remove and let cool for 10 minutes before removing from pans and putting on rack to cool completely.

Makes 8 servings.

Sugar glaze:

Combine 1/2 cup (125 mL) icing sugar, sifted, with 1 tbsp (15 mL) water. Pour over cakes.

*Whole wheat flour is my addition; the original recipe called for 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour.
**The original recipe called for sweetened applesauce; I don't think the cake needs the added sugar.
***I didn't see this option until I was making the cake, and I didn't have walnuts on hand, so can't vouch for the flavour with their addition.

Olivia sifts.

Blending together wet and dry ingredients.

Finished product!

For supper, I made a Beef Wellington look alike: from January 2004's Chatelaine: Pork tenderloin en croûte. This is pork tenderloin, wrapped in prosciutto, wrapped in puff pastry. Yum yum. The flavouring is Dijon mustard, rosemary, salt and pepper. Simple stuff. I skip all the fussy steps requiring you to make fancy cut-outs to put on top of the pastry, and I used pre-rolled pastry, just because that's what I had. This was a second go-around for us, and definitely a keeper. Delish. We would have eaten the whole tenderloin if I hadn't foreseen that and overloaded our salad bowls and roasted multi-coloured baby potatoes and garlic for the side.

We've been eating with a Doozy candle on the table recently, which Olivia thinks means we're having a fancy supper. This meal was a bit of a fancy supper (but simple, really). Oh, Saturday night, if only you could last forever...

Prior to rolling.

Ready to go in the oven.

Finished product!

Complete meal/fuzzy pic.

Cutest kid in the world/biased mother.

December 13th: Upside-Down Chicken Pot Pies

It's been two months since I last made pot pie, so it was time again. This one from December 2010's Chatelaine: Upside-Down Chicken Pot Pies. As far as weeknight meals go, this is the quickest pot pie I've made yet. Would have been even quicker if I had turned on the large burner under my large pot rather than the small one. Bloody stupid glass top stove. Again, this one is not as good as our famous keeper recipe, which I haven't shared yet, but it was tasty nonetheless.

Side dish to this meal was Braised red cabbage from in erika's kitchen. The recipe ingredients are almost identical to the Chatelaine one I made Saturday, but the longer cooking time made for more tender cabbage in the end. We liked this version a bit better, but decided we're not super fans of red cabbage. Gorgeous colour though, and I'm assuming chalk full of nutrients and likely local to boot (I didn't check the sign when I bought it).

(Not sure why my links aren't navigating to a new page. Am I writing my HTML code incorrectly? Too tired to figure this one out...)

September 29th: chicken pot pie

Verdict:
Try Again: chicken pot pie

A few years ago, there was a chicken pot pie recipe in the Ottawa Citizen which came from a local restaurant. I tried it once, we all fell in love with it, and now I make it a few times a year. The filling is made by poaching bone-in chicken in water, then using the same water to cook vegetables, then the same water again (by now, a lovely broth) to make the roux. The crowning touch is the puff pastry crust. It is rich, filling, delicious.


Thus, when the February 2010 Chatelaine had a recipe for a puff pastry-topped chicken pot pie, my first thought was to pass it over entirely. We already have an amazing keeper recipe; why try something new? But something new is what I do. Eventually, the recipe (which I pulled out of the magazine even though I didn't think I would make it) wore me down, and tonight I committed and finally made it: Tuscan-style chicken pot pie. (There is also a video you can watch.)


(Side note here and now: unless you are crazy like me, do not attempt to make any pot pie on a weeknight. This is a time-consuming project, even with a cheater crust.)


I had a few doubts about some of the ingredients the recipe called for (namely, fennel bulb and artichoke hearts). Sure enough, those are not for me. The rest of the filling was good though, with a tasty roux. Oh, and huge: this pot pie yields 6 hearty servings. Yay for lunch tomorrow--for all of us! I was most intrigued by the crust, which calls for cutting half a frozen puff pastry in half, rolling out both halves, and then sandwiching them with a Parmesan-rosemary layer. With rosemary still thriving in my garden, how could I pass this by? I'm undecided on the crust so far--much denser than a normal puff pastry. Olivia loved it, requesting, "more pancake."


Greg gave it the thumbs down (in comparison to our already keeper recipe). I, however, plan to keep it, tweak it, and see if I can improve it. For starters, I'll likely use chicken thighs next time rather than breasts, as I find darker meat tastier in this sort of a dish, and it holds up better to extended cooking. I'll sub in a few other veggies for the above-mentioned rejections, and we'll see how version two turns out!

(For those who don't know how I operate, version two may not take place for months or years to come. It most likely will happen eventually though, as I am a sucker for puff pastry. No more than once a month! It's dreadfully unhealthy stuff. So good.)