Recipe Experiment: Crescent Pizza Pockets

So Foodie came over yesterday, and I had some crescent rolls in my fridge, so I asked if she wanted to make something with them, so we decided to make these Crescent Pizza Pockets. They turned out pretty great.

We made some minor adjustments to the recipe, and didn't exactly measure ingredient sizes, so they dribbled a bit, but they were still delicious.For the sauce, we used my current favorite flavor of Classico: Fire Roasted Tomato and Garlic. We also used a cheese blend I get from the store with a bunch of Italian cheeses instead of just mozzarella. And on top of the cheese, we added a bit of oregano.

They turned out great, if a bit soft. I might lower the temperature for the next time I try them and cook them at least five minutes more.

Pictures:

all stuffed, one folded. You can see the oregano on the top of the cheese here.

Ready to be cooked. We had some issues with them splitting, but it was easy enough to pinch the splits together.

Finished. There were less dribbles than I expected for how overstuffed they were. You can see the parm on mine if you squint.

I still have another can of rolls. I might make something like this. I've got a thing of string cheese in my fridge at the moment, after all. We shall see.

Recipe Experiment - Hash Brown Cups

I've always been fascinated by the muffin-tin recipes I've seen out there on the web, but most of them employ things that I don't or won't eat (eggs). Last weekend, though, I decided to go looking to see what I could find. I happened upon a recipe that just sounded too good and simple not to try: Parmesan Hash Brown Cups. It turned out to be a little more labor intensive than I anticipated, but overall, it was well worth the effort.

Now I love Parmesan, and I'm so so with onions now, though they used to be on my least-favorite list, but I wanted to make this in a way that I loved, so I decided to switch out the green onions for bacon bits (I'm sure you could do this with fresh bacon, but I generally don't keep that in my fridge, while I always have bacon bits if I can help it. I use Hormel, so it's real bacon, just diced and crumbled). Since I was going with bacon, I also changed the cheese to cheddar instead, because they go better together than Parmesan would. I changed the measurement for the bacon to half a cup, because when I opened the package of Simply Potatoes, I was shocked at how much was in there. I wanted to make sure I had enough bacon scattered throughout the potatoes. It did seem the right amount when I ate them. I also added another tablespoon of oil, because it really didn't feel like enough to coat everything I had in the bowl. Now I'm less sure, because you do spray the cups with oil as well, so if you only want to go with the two, go for it.

My oven runs a little hot, but I went with her temperature, and put it in for an hour. By the end, even the tops were nice and golden, if still soft. I let it sit a little, then went in with a knife around the edges until they turned with the knife. I put a paper towel over the top and a regular baking tray over that, then flipped the lot, and voila, perfect little cups. Some were definitely smaller than others, but overall delicious. As she said, they are a bit chewy as opposed to crispy, but they're so good, it's well worth trying.

Recipe Experiment - Balsamic Chicken with Tomatoes

So it's been a while since I posted, but I finally made a recipe that I've been considering for a while. Balsamic Chicken. It turned out great, so I thought I'd share what I ended up with.

I started on All Recipes, where I found two possibilities: Braised Balsamic Chicken and Roasted Balsamic Chicken with Baby Tomatoes. I liked the ingredients for the first, but I preferred the cooking style of the second, so I combined them.

I marinaded it overnight, and it was a little frozen still when I cooked it, but not horribly. Turned out sweet and juicy, and was perfect.

Here's the recipe I ended up using:

Balsamic Chicken and Tomatoes

1/2 cup Balsamic Vinegrette
1 tablespoon Olive Oil
2 tablespoons Garlic
-- (I like it strong. I think the original called for one clove, so adjust accordingly depending on how much you like.)
2 teaspoons Oregano
-- (again, I love Oregano. If you prefer one of the other basic Italian seasonings, double that instead. Or just do 3 teaspoons of the general Italian seasonings.)
2 teaspoons Italian Seasonings
2 Chicken breasts (the recipe calls for 4 to 6, so if you use less, use half or a third of the can instead)
1 14.5 oz can of Tomatoes (I used one with garlic and seasonings in, but any chunked tomatoes will do)

Mix together vinegrette, oil, and spices. Place chicken in a container and pour over the mix, then store it in the fridge for at least four hours. Overnight is better.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Put chicken in a high-lipped pan. (I poured in the juice from the bag as well, and braised the chicken once during the cooking process.)

Cook chicken for 30 minutes, braising once if you wish.

Add canned tomatoes over the top of the chicken. (The can I used was definitely too much for two, but probably would have been just about right for three.)

Cook for 10 more minutes.

Let cool and serve.

I had it with potatoes, but I think it would also work with rice or similar.

Recipe Experiment - Mummy Pizza Puffs

So my friend Foodie used to come over every weekend at my old place because we lived in the same complex. We can't do that as much any more now that I've moved, but she came over yesterday for our yearly watch of the two good Mummy movies (with Brendan Frasier and Rachel Weisz).

She'd found a recipe, so we decided to try it out. It's from Campbell's website, and they call them Campbell's Mummy Pizza Puffs. We made a few changes to the recipe for our own purposes, but they were absolutely delicious. She stopped at the store and got a different puff pastry dough brand: Aussie's Bakery. Their dough had no trans fat in it, so it's a far better choice if you can find it. For the sauce, we used my favorite brand: Classico. I highly recommend their sauces, as they're the best I've ever tasted. We used the fire-roasted tomato and garlic, which was perfect for pizza sauce. We sprinkled a bit of oregano over the top, though I really didn't taste it in the final product. We also added more of the olives inside the pizza, and she added some mushrooms to hers as well, with no variation in the cooking time.

I was happily reminded of an old frozen puff-pastry pizza Pepperidge Farms used to have, so if you remember those fondly, this will probably be something you'll enjoy. We think it would work well just as a simple crust, too, and then we could have made a possible total of fourteen, with all the extra crust we would have had. We'll definitely be making these again sometime.

Here's some shots of the pizzas once they were finished:

All cooked. Mine on the left, Foodie's on the right.

And all plated up.

New recipe - Tropical Island Chicken

*waves* Hi! I am still alive. Been busy with Christmas and a few less-fun things, but I'm doing a recipe, so I thought I'd share it today.

I started with this recipe at Food.com for Tropical Island Chicken.

My changes:
I always use breasts, as I'm not a fan of dark meat the way most people are.
Instead of onion powder, I used flakes, and instead of garlic salt I used garlic powder. There was plenty of other salt in the recipe, so I didn't bother to replace it.
I also had to replace the crushed pineapple because I realized I had none, so I used half of a citrus-flavoured Sobe, though hopefully if I like this, I'll be trying it again with actual pineapple. I also cut the amounts of the sauce recipe in half because of that, and I still worry that I ended up with too much.
Instead of the 30 minutes after saucing, I'm going to check it at 10, and another 10 after that, just to see how it looks. I might add more sauce then, too.

Should be interesting. We'll see if it works. Smells great in here right now. :) I'll let you know how it turns out.

ETA: Well, post-eating, it wasn't rich enough, and cooked a bit too long. I definitely think it would be much better with actual pineapple, so I might try it again. We'll see.

New Recipe Experiment - Taco casserole

Been wanting to make tacos for a while now, and I had some tater tots in the freezer that needed to be used, so I thought I'd try something new.

Ingredients:
1 lb ground hamburger
1 small tomato
1/2 pepper
Shredded cheese of your choice (as much as you want)
enough tater tots to cover the bottom of a casserole dish
taco seasoning
2 large handfuls corn chips, slightly crushed
Other possible ingredients:
sour cream (good at the top above the vegetables)
olives (put in with the vegetables)
guacamole (put in with the sour cream)
beans (put in with the beef)

Instructions:
Cook the tater tots according to the packaging. I sprinkled them with taco seasoning before cooking. While the tater tots cook, brown up the meat and cut the vegetables. Once everything's ready, layer the casserole.
Layers:
tater tots
light layering of cheese
meat
vegetables
cheese (optional)
chips
cheese
seasoning (optional)
Put into a pre-heated 350 degree oven and cook for 25 minutes.

The meat is a bit dry...I might put some tomato sauce in with the meat once it's cooked next time, to help bind it together. I also definitely didn't have enough cheese for what I wanted, but it was very edible, definitely.

More recipe experiments--Deep Dish Pizza

So, I've been contemplating doing a deep-dish pizza recipe of my own, but I kept pushing it to the side because usually I'm only cooking for myself, and I wanted to make it with someone who could share it with me. But finally this week I've decided to just do it, so I got a few things from the store and played with some ideas last night.

I don't tend to make my own crust because I don't have enough work surface to do that right. So I decided to go with packaged crescent roll dough, which didn't quite work out for a few reasons. First of all, it's cut into triangles, and an incredibly loose dough, so every time you pick it up, it falls apart. I played with it for quite a while pressing it together, then putting it into the pan I'd chosen (a rectangular pyrex dish), then docked the base to try to keep it from puffing when I put it in the oven. I popped it into the oven at 350 for 10 minutes, but unfortunately the docking didn't help--it puffed up a great deal more than I expected, though I should have, given that that's what the dough was meant to do.

The sauce I made the night before with an 8 ounce can of tomato sauce and a 14.5 ounce can of pre-chopped tomatoes, though once I used it, I ran short at the very end, so I could probably have made that 2 8-ounce cans of sauce. I put in some Italian seasoning, garlic, oregano, and dried onion flakes, mixed it all together, then covered it and put it in the fridge overnight. It gelled a bit, which actually made it easier for spreading.

The rest of the ingredients were all my favorite toppings--a small can of crushed olives (sliced would probably be okay, but I actually liked this, because I could spread it and mix it into the sauce a bit), the rest of my yellow pepper and tomato from the week before, pepperoni slices, and sliced and shredded mozzarella cheese.

Layering:
I put one layer of the sliced cheese on the bottom, then spread the sauce over that, then put the olives on top of that, a sprinkle of cheese, then my chopped vegetables, then another layer of cheese and sauce, then my pepperoni, and finally a last layer of sliced cheese.

I put it in a 400 degree oven for a half hour, which turned out to be too hot, because the top of the crust burned. I might stick with 350 for cooking next time, or possibly try to cook it for ten minutes, then put aluminum over for the rest of the time to keep it from burning.

It made enough for eight servings with my dish. Probably enough to serve four to eight people, depending on what else you serve it with. Not as deep as I thought it would be, and very fall-apart because of the crust, but quite filling. I'll have leftovers for a good while.


Overall, it tasted quite good, but the crust was definitely off, so I'll have to play with that a bit, but I think this would be a fun one to try again.

I was thinking as I was layering it that it might be fun to try it with barbecued chicken--maybe some peppers and olives and tomatoes...

Peruvian Grilled Chicken Redux

So I took the rest of the chicken from last night, grilled it on our countertop grill, then cut it up, and made myself chicken tacos tonight. Good, if a bit dry. Might have been better with a bit of salsa, perhaps. I think if I try it for tacos again, I'll probably stew a bunch of it in my crock pot and try it that way, so that it's a bit juicier on its own. Maybe with a bit of tomato sauce on it.

Overall, the two breasts made enough for about three or four servings, depending on what was eaten with it. Definitely worth playing with a bit.

More food experiments - Peruvian Grilled Chicken

Made a new recipe tonight--well, actually yesterday, and it marinaded for 24 hours.

Peruvian Grilled Chicken from the Epicurious website.

I did the recipe as on the website, though I used dried garlic as I had no fresh, and I used chicken breasts instead of a whole chicken. Mixed up the marinade, and it smelled absolutely delicious. Put the breasts in a ziplock bag, poured in the marinade, then rolled it up and put it in the fridge.

Tonight, instead of grilling it (I do have access to one, but I don't feel comfortable using it for a couple of reasons), I put it in the oven at 350 for 40 minutes. Came out perfect. Just slightly zippy and earthy and absolutely delicious.

I think I'll grill second breast on our countertop grill, cut it up, then make a chicken taco out of it. It's got just the right flavour for it.

I'll definitely be using this one again.

Food experiment--Casear Salad Chicken Wrap

So we went to the store last night and I got a whole bunch of a lot more fresh ingredients than I usually buy. I've got a post I'm going to try to put together about the recipe sites I've been using, but this one came right off the top of my head. I based it on something mom and grandma and I used to get at the Cucina Fresco near Grandma's old nursing home.

I got one of those packs of pre-cooked chicken strips, put half of the package (a small handful or quarter cup) in a bowl, then added half a plum tomato (my favorite tomato), 1/5 of a yellow pepper (any colour would work), a sprinkle of Parmesan cheese, a small handful of shredded Italian cheese (I get this mixed, but this could be real shredded Parmesan or mozzarella, or any of your favorite Italian cheese, shredded or crumbled small), then I added a quarter cup of Caesar dressing to the bowl, mixed it all up, then added three large handfuls of romaine lettuce (though any crisp lettuce would work well in this), and mixed again. I put all this in a pre-heated burrito-sized tortilla, then did my best to roll it up (though it didn't work too well, as I'd overfilled it). nice and crispy and very tasty, if I do say so myself. The amount I made would feed two people nicely with some soup.

Follow Friday and more

I- Follow Friday

For Follow Friday today I've only added one more blog, Olive Tree Genealogy. It's a lovely blog that I'm very much enjoying so far.

II- Genealogy

Oh, Spuch post for the week is the second part of my Visual Family Tree, this time focusing on the Hansen side of the family tree. Includes 4 generations of Hansens, reaching back before 1900.

Comparing the photos of my great-grandparents' siblings was rather interesting. One of my Danish friends mentioned that my great-grandfather's family looked rather well-off, given how they're dressed, though that could have more to do with the fact that Holger's family were near a city, while Oline's family was in the country. Something to look into, at least.

It was also mentioned that the naming in my great-grandfather's family was a bit odd. Holger had two brothers named Hans--Hans Jorgen and Hans Knudsen. Jorgen is less unusual, but Knudsen is distinctly a surname, in this case being used as a middle name. In looking into it further, it seems that one brother was named for one grandfather (Hans Knudsen, hence the Hansen name for the entire family), and one for the other (Jorgen Larsen). Definitely made me think I've a lot of interesting things when it comes to surnames used in odd ways in my family--I'll definitely have to work on a blog-post about that.

A few weeks back I made myself a research log using Excel and making tabs for each of my four major families to keep them separate for now, and so that I don't duplicate too much research. Then, in an effort to focus on the people I need the most information about, I went through my direct ancestors and made a new list of people who fit that bill. So now I have five tabs, and I'm considering making a sixth, just focusing on the dead-end brides in my tree.

No other discoveries today, big or small, though I did learn that ukendt kvinde means "unknown woman" in Danish... :)

III- Cooking

Cooked my chicken today. It's okay, but I don't think I'll be making it again. The sweet and earthy didn't quite mix right for my taste buds.

I'm thinking I'll make something with paprika, yogurt, and lemon juice next time. Now I just have to find a recipe that works.

Did make myself some garlic bread with the sourdough round. That was nice, though I don't think I cooked it quite long enough. The garlic was a bit sweet.

Food Experiment II

Found another chicken recipe to try, which looks interesting to me because it goes outside my usual comfort zone when it comes to marinades and uses paprika. I've made a slight change to the recipe, taking out the curry and adding garlic, but otherwise going with the basic recipe for Honey Chicken at allrecipes.com.

All mixed up now, and I'll be marinading it overnight, so I'll have to report back on how it worked tomorrow. I ended up with too much, and probably could have marinaded double the amount of chicken, but at least I know it'll all be well covered.

I considered using jarred garlic--I don't use it fresh enough to get cloves, as I always use about 4-10 cloves, and the rest ends up sprouting on me, so this is my way of dealing with that--but decided since everything else was powdered, I might as well do that with the garlic, too.

I do have the makings for garlic bread, though--a lovely sourdough round, fresh(-ish) garlic and butter--so I might make that tomorrow as well.

Recipe results/Movie reviews

So, the overall results of my chicken experiment? Success. Just the right amount of tang. Marinaded for about five or six hours, then cooked for about 35 minutes overall, 5 of which were under the broiler, and it turned out just perfect. :)

Now I just have to decide what to try out next.


Watched a few movies recently that I'd not seen. One movie in the Theatre today with my mother-in-law and brother-in-law, The Sorcerer's Apprentice, which was fun overall, so long as you don't expect a nice deep plot or anything.

I also watched Underworld: Rise of the Lycans and Reign of Fire On Demand, as I'm definitely not willing to pay for them. Underworld? About as expected. Not quite as bad as I'd feared, but definitely not enough plot to really hold up a full movie on its own. Fire was a bit better than I'd expected. Bale did an excellent job, no shock, and while the plot was a bit shallow, and the premise definitely left something to be desired, overall, I enjoyed it.

But I do think that the next movie I watch needs to have a lot more substance to it. For my sanity's sake.

Experiments in food

I don't cook enough.

I grew up in a household where my mother made most of our meals from scratch, but for some reason, it never caught with me. Likely because I didn't help her cook enough. But I'm slowly but surely trying to remedy that.

I generally only cook for myself, as my husband has a very specific diet and prefers to make his own meals. Which means when I do cook, most times, I have leftovers, so if I find I don't like something...that's food wasted. It takes a lot for me to get past that, unfortunately. But I'm trying.

First step: Finding recipes I like that I will use again.

So today, I'm marinading some chicken breast. Wings and breasts are about the only cuts of chicken I tend to eat. I got a pre-prepared pair of boneless, skinless chicken breasts from the store, and then looked up a recipe to use on allrecipes.com, which is one of my two main places to find recipes.

The recipe I'm converting is this Barbeque Chicken recipe.

I used the converter to change the ingredient amounts to 2 servings, which worked out to:
1/3 cup lemon juice
1 1/2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 1/2 tablespoons vinegar (I used red wine vinegar)
1 teaspoon oregano
3/4 teaspoon garlic powder
2 chicken breasts

And when I cook it, I'll put it in the oven for 40 minutes to an hour (depending on how it looks), and add salt to taste when it's done.

Pretty basic, but I'll let you know how it tastes once I've finished.