Shrimp, Basil and Lemon Risotto

Shrimp and Lemon Risotto - made January 12, 2014, modified from Pam Niedzwiecki's Tastebook

One of my goals (I don't like to call them "resolutions" due to the stigma of resolutions being very fleeting) for 2014 besides the usual "cook more often" is "use up what you have before you buy more". That mantra applies not just to clothes, shoes and exercise DVDs (not to mention "read all the books on my unread shelf before trolling amazon") but also to my pantry and refrigerator. Remember, I have ingredient hoarding tendencies. They're most prevalent in regards to baking ingredients, as evidenced by the 4 boxes of cake flour I somehow ended up with after the holiday baking season, but also apply to ingredients I use for cooking.

I don't know how long I've had the opened box of arborio rice in my pantry, probably since the last time I made Lemon and Parmesan Risotto which fortunately was not as far back as 2010 when I first blogged the recipe but it wasn't within the last 6 months either. Okay, time to use up the arborio rice. The most obvious choice is in risotto but I wanted a different recipe this time. It's also that time of year when lemons are in abundance and I've had every lemon tree owner I know ask me if I need/want lemons. Risotto and lemon just go well together. I also like that this recipe adds basil to the mix. I modified it from the original recipe which called for grilling the shrimp separately. At the time I made this, it was cold outside and I didn't want to hang out on my balcony grilling shrimp so I simplified it to add shrimp directly to the risotto to cook over the stovetop.

This recipe is also different from my norm in that it uses Fontina cheese instead of Parmesan. The Fontina is more subtly flavored so I didn't taste it as much as I would have had it been Parmesan cheese. If you like the bite of cheese, I suggest garnishing the finished serving(s) of risotto with grated Parmesan at the end. Instead, the Fontina added to the creaminess of the risotto. Before I added it, the risotto was a nice fluffy texture. After the Fontina went it, it became more moist, almost wet. Still good but I cooked it a few minutes longer to dry it out a bit.

3 cups chicken broth mixed with 1 1/2 cups water
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 large shallot, peeled and finely chopped
1 1/2 cups arborio rice
2/3 cup dry white wine
zest from 2 lemons
3 tablespoons lemon juice
1 cup Fontina cheese
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 1/2 pounds shrimp, shelled and deveined (more if you like lots of shrimp)
1/2 cup fresh basil, coarsely chopped

1. Place broth and water in a medium-size saucepan; bring to a simmer. 
2. In a large saucepan, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add shallot and cook 3 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add rice and stir until rice is coated with oil. Cook for 2 minutes. Add wine and cook until absorbed, about 1 minute.
3. Add 1/2 cup of the simmering broth to the rice. Cook over medium-low heat, stirring until absorbed. Add remaining broth mixture, 1/2 cup at a time, cooking in the same manner. This will take 25-30 minutes. Do not shortcut this step as this is what ensures the rice will cook properly.
4. Stir in the lemon zest, juice, cheese, salt and pepper. Add shrimp and stir until pink and cooked. Stir in basil just before serving. Garnish with lemon zest and/or grated Parmesan if desired.

Restaurant Review: Kabab & Curry's

Kabab & Curry's - lunch on January 10, 2014

My first social eating occasion of the new year was to meet my friend Jenny for lunch after I got back from vacation. As always, I searched yelp for someplace nearby that was a small business and that we've never tried before. Kabab and Curry's had a 4-star rating on yelp based on over 800 reviews so it seemed like a good choice. Surprisingly, I had never heard of them before. I say surprisingly because they're not that far from me, their yelp reviews praised their butter chicken (my favorite dish in any Indian restaurant), and they're not that expensive. I checked out their menu online and decided it'd be a great place to meet.

So, after I had such high expectations, unfortunately they weren't quite met. The place itself is rather modest which is fine, nothing wrong with that. What I hadn't read closely enough is that lunch was an all-you-can-eat buffet. That would've been okay except when we went through the line, none of the dishes laid out were marked so you couldn't tell what you were getting. I'm not the most adventurous eater in the world so it didn't thrill me not to know. I made the mistake of making the observation aloud to Jenny that I wish they had markers that labeled what the dishes were since I couldn't tell. I happened to be in front of a serving dish of what looked like chunks of potato with spinach and the guy in front of me overheard me and told me, "what do you not know? That's spinach and potato." I was more amused than offended because he sounded so offended that I was questioning the establishment.

Another disappointment was that butter chicken wasn't one of the selections at the buffet nor was their chicken tikka masala. They did have tandoori chicken which was good and the lamb meatballs were okay. I did have a small serving of the potato and spinach dish the guy ahead of me was so protective of and they were okay but nothing special. I didn't get much on my first pass so decided to go back in line for the tandoori chicken. I stood in line with the others and the line didn't move as it appeared they were out of the tandoori chicken and everyone was waiting for them to bring more. After almost ten minutes of waiting, I gave up and went back to the table. Didn't seem worth it to keep waiting.

Fortunately, naan came with the meal and they delivered one basket of warm naan after we asked for it when we first sat down. After my thwarted attempt at a second helping of tandoori chicken, I asked for another basket of naan. It took awhile for it to come out but it was warm so maybe they were still baking more because of high demand. The place was pretty busy with a steady stream of customers. For $10, I can see that it would be a good deal and there was a mix of ethnicities, not just Indian folks, coming for lunch so the place was quite popular with a diverse group of diners.

When Jenny and I left, I noticed all the stickers proclaiming the restaurant as Michelin Guide recommended and rated. I have to admit, based on this one lunch visit, I was floored by those accolades. The wait staff was very nice but the service, even for a buffet set up, took too long as there wasn't enough of them to wait on all the people in both large rooms of the restaurant. Not having the buffet table properly stocked during the lunch hour also seemed like a kitchen miss. And frankly, I didn't think the lunch food was that great. I'm going to have to come back for dinner so I can order the butter chicken and maybe understand their devoted customer base a little better.

Twix Blondie Bars

Twix Blondie Bars - made January 17, 2014 from Curly Girl Kitchen

I'm posting slightly out of order because today, January 22, is National Blonde Brownie Day. Bet you didn't know that. Yeah, me either until I looked up January Food Holidays. Lest you think I actually planned ahead and coordinated to bake and post this at the appropriate time, the truth is I originally picked this recipe to try out because the original recipe from Curly Girl Kitchen uses cream cheese for the frosting and I still had a Costco-sized block of cream cheese from my holiday baking season to use up. Hitting National Blonde Brownie Day was pure coincidence. The recipe reads like a chocolate chip cookie in bar cookie form which I traditionally don't make because I prefer chocolate chip cookies as actual cookies, not bars. But I decided to try it anyway and since it technically isn't chocolate and is in bar form, it qualifies as a blonde brownie or a blondie for short. I'm glad I did try it though because this was a nice little blondie. It's more of a chewy brown sugar blondie than a chocolate chip cookie. I added chopped up Twix as well as chocolate chips and that added a little bit of crunch from the shortbread of the Twix.

Ironically, I liked the taste of the plain blondies so much that I skipped making the frosting for it because I didn't want the cream cheese to mask or compete with the dark brown sugar flavor of the bars. I'm going to have to try another recipe to use up my cream cheese. These bars were great just plain.

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted
2 cups packed dark brown sugar
2 eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg (I substituted cinnamon)
optional add-ins - chocolate chips, chopped pecans, etc (I added chocolate chips and chopped up Twix)

Frosting (if you're inclined)
8 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
1 cup powdered sugar
1 teaspoon light corn syrup

1. Preheat the oven to 350.  Spray a 9 x 13 pan with nonstick spray.
2. In a large bowl, combine the melted butter and brown sugar with a whisk until smooth.  Whisk in the eggs and vanilla.  In a separate bowl, combine the flour, salt, baking powder and nutmeg, then add to the batter.  Stir in any add-ins such as chocolate chips or nuts.  Batter will be thick.
3. Spread evenly in the pan and bake for 25 minutes, until the edges are golden brown but the center still looks a little gooey.  Let cool for 30 minutes.
4. Combine the softened cream cheese with the powdered sugar and corn syrup until smooth; spread over the still-warm bars.  Let cool completely before cutting into squares. 

Buttermilk Baked "Fried" Chicken

Buttermilk Baked "Fried" Chicken - made January 11, 2014

Did you know if you want to oven bake anything and make it have the texture of something deep-fried, an easy way to do it is roll it in panko crumbs? It comes out crispy and not as greasy as if you had fried it. I don't buy regular bread crumbs anymore (ha, like I ever did since I don't cook as much as I bake) but instead go with panko crumbs. They're Japanese bread crumbs and you can find it at any Asian grocery store or in the Asian food aisle at a "regular" grocery store.

I made up this recipe after reviewing a number of similar ones. They all had the same basic premise: soak the chicken in buttermilk for a couple of hours, dredge in a flour and spice dry mix and roll in panko. Spray with cooking spray to help it brown during baking. This is a simple recipe to make although it came out a little bland for me. I think it would be better to add more spices to the flour or even directly on the chicken before rolling it in the panko crumbs. Try ginger, cayenne pepper, chili powder or any other spice of your choice.

Nevertheless, I was pleased that it did get crunchy thanks to the crumb coating. Not only was it healthier than deep frying but I didn't have the hassle of cleaning my deep fryer or dumping the excess oil. Just line your baking pan with foil and it's easy to clean up after.

6-8 chicken thighs or 4 boneless chicken breasts
2 cups buttermilk
1/2 cup sour cream
1 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon allspice
1/2 teaspoon paprika
2 cups panko crumbs

1. Whisk together the buttermilk and sour cream. Place chicken in a gallon-size ziploc bag and pour in buttermilk-sour cream mixture. Seal bag and refrigerate for 2 hours.
2. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line a baking pan with foil and lightly spray with nonstick cooking spray.
3. Combine flour, salt, pepper, allspice and paprika in a shallow bowl. Pour panko crumbs in a separate shallow bowl.
4. Remove chicken pieces from ziploc bag and shake off excess mixture. Dredge in flour and spices then roll in panko crumbs coating completely. If panko crumbs aren't sticking to the chicken, re-dip into the buttermilk mixture and roll directly in the crumbs. Arrange chicken in single layer in prepared pan and lightly spray with cooking spray.
5. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until golden brown and cooked through.

Slow Cooker Chicken in Honey Sauce

Slow Cooker Chicken in Honey Sauce - made January 5, 2014 from Slava's Recipes

After I got back from my trip, I didn't jump right back into baking since I figured everyone was trying to eat healthier and cut back on baked goods, including myself. At least for now. January is also the time when I make yet another effort to cook more and eat at home more instead of going out to eat with friends or getting takeout (20 days into the new year and I'm having only mixed success with this one.)

As always, pulling out my slow cooker is a safe bet. I looked through the recipes I've pinned onto my Cooking board on pinterest and was struck with how I tend to pin the same type of recipes: easy to make, slow cooker or otherwise, usually shrimp or chicken and if a chicken dish in a slow cooker, always seemingly some combination of soy sauce and honey. They all taste really similar too. I'm a pretty boring eater if I have to cook it myself.

This recipe epitomizes the stereotype of my cooking on almost all fronts. It was ridiculously easy to make since it didn't involve anything more than stirring the sauce ingredients together and throwing in the crock pot with the chicken. And like almost everything I cook in a crock pot, it gets watery/soupy so I had to thicken it with some cornstarch dissolved in water. It was fine and fed me for a week but I have to admit, by the end of the week, I was so tired of eating the same thing that I packed up the rest to put in the freezer for another time. And I only made half the recipe below. Alas, the drawback of crock pot cooking for one.

1½ - 2 pounds boneless,skinless chicken breasts
salt and freshly ground black pepper,to taste
2 cups honey
1 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup ketchup
1/4 cup olive oil
2 cloves garlic,peeled and minced
sesame seeds for garnish

1. Place chicken breasts in slow cooker, season with salt and pepper.
2. In a mixing bowl, combine honey, soy sauce, ketchup, olive oil and garlic.
3. Mix well and pour mixture over chicken
4. Cover slow cooker and cook on low heat setting for 6-8 hours.
5. Garnish with sesame seeds and serve over rice or pasta.

London Day 9 - Rest Day and Restaurant Review: The Pheasant Restaurant

London Day 9 - January 3, 2014, lunch at The Pheasant Restaurant

A break in the rain

Our last day in London was a quiet one, partly because we were tired after traipsing all over London and Paris for the past week and a half and partly because a good portion of the day and night regaled us with rainy weather. At one point it even hailed. Fortunately, that point was when we were still holed up in the hotel room. My nieces had discovered the BBC channel and we watched The Great British Bakeoff. We love cooking and baking shows and we were able to catch back to back episodes of the bake off, including the finale. Fun times.

When the rain finally let up, we ventured out for our last meal of "real British food". Thanks to yelp and google maps, our best technology friends on vacation, we found a place called the Pheasant Restaurant that had gotten good reviews on yelp and was a mile away - very walkable given what we were used to walking during the whole trip.

Inside one of the levels of the restaurant

We lucked out as the weather held and didn't start raining again until we had reached the restaurant and gotten seated. We got even luckier as the Pheasant Restaurant served delicious food from start to finish. Seriously, forget that stereotype that you can't get good British food in the UK. You can. You just need to know where to go. And if you're ever around Heathrow, I would recommend searching out the Pheasant Restaurant.

To start with was a lovely basket of fresh, crusty but not too crusty bread rolls. After a long, cold walk without any breakfast or lunch (it was mid-afternoon by the time we got there), it was manna from heaven. I hadn't thought I could get bread that good outside of France but I was wrong. You have to have some idea of how good that bread was when I could gush about it for a whole paragraph. Good bread.

Shyla's Chicken and Mushroom Pie

Steak & Kidney Pie

In keeping with the traditional British food, Shyla and I both got meat pies - chicken for her while I went with the steak and kidney pie with a side of chips. (At this point, I'd been overseas long enough that I could almost think of "chips" as French fries instead "Doritos".) I have to say once again how amazingly good the meat pie was. The crust was so flaky it was almost like phyllo dough but better. Although I know enough about making pie crusts to understand there was probably lard or butter or both in it, it wasn't greasy at all, just flaky. It was done to perfection and the meat chunks were very tender. The sauce was delicious. I've had good meat pies before but this was probably one of the best if not the best.

Fish and Chips with mushy peas

Lauren went with traditional fish and chips for her last British meal and that was impressive in its size, presentation and taste as well. Crisp on the outside, tender, flaky fish on the inside. The chips on all of our orders were a bit too large for my taste as not all of them were done to mealy tenderness which is how I like my fries, er, chips, but that was only a minor issue.

Sticky Toffee Pudding - the before shot

For dessert, of course, it was sticky toffee pudding for Lauren (Shyla was full) and I have to give the nod to this one over the one we had at The Windmill a week prior. This one had the texture of a baked cake rather than a steamed one so it was lighter and fluffier. Although I still don't like dates, I avoided the obvious ones on top and just had a couple of bites of the cake. It was so good I instantly started plotting how I was going to try and make one when I got home and hope it turned out equally well.

Bread and butter pudding with custard

For my own dessert order, I decided to try the bread and butter pudding. I was thinking it would come out like the American version of bread pudding but I was slightly wrong and slightly right. Wrong in that it was baked with less custard so it was more dry but it did come with a side of custard you could pour over the top. I was slightly right in that the middle of the bread pudding had more of the moistness and consistency of the bread pudding I'm used to having. This one had a more pronounced butter taste, hence the "bread and butter" moniker. I can't say it was my favorite dessert but I'm glad I tried it to see what it was like, even if I did have to nudge the raisins aside.

Pouring Rain

Thus ended our last meal in London. We left early the next morning to catch our flights back home. It might have been somewhat fitting that we waited for the bus that would take us to Heathrow in pouring rain. Considering the time of year though, I consider we were pretty fortunate that it didn't rain as much as it could have during our trip and we lucked out with some good weather days. All in all, it was a fantastic trip. Thanks, London (and Paris) for the memories. I will forever "Mind the Gap".

Back to the recipes next...

Restaurant Review: Comptoir des Crepes

Comptoir des Crepes - lunch on January 2, 2014

Since we had been thwarted by not finding a creperie the night before, for our last meal in Paris, we knew we wanted crepes. Fortunately, the area near our hotel was known as Creperie Row so it was easy to find a crepe place before we picked up our luggage at the hotel.

Comptoir des Crepes lived up to its name by offering a variety of both sweet and savory crepes. In France, savory crepes are more commonly known as galettes. I had been used to thinking of galettes as the open-faced easy version of fruit pies, easier to make and more rustic looking. French galettes are savory crepes made with buckwheat flour while sweet crepes are made with wheat flour.

Thai galette

As with crepes, galettes can take any number of "fillings". My nieces went ethnic with galettes of a Thai and an Indian flair. I stuck to the more traditional with jambon, emmental and egg. I wasn't expecting the egg to be over easy and I normally don't like runny yolk but this was good. The galette was crisp without being hard and there's no such thing as bad cheese in France so the emmental was a good touch.

Galette with jambon, emmenthal cheese and egg

The galettes were also light enough that we had room for dessert crepes as well. Although, let's face it, we would've probably gotten dessert anyway whether we had room for it or not. When in Paris....

Banana and Nutella Crepe

Since I have a love for bananas and nutella, especially together, my dessert crepe was an easy choice. There's just something good about caramelized bananas paired with nutella that says "pick me! pick me!" My nieces wanted something different that they'd never had and normally wouldn't get at home so they got the Pistachio Cream Crepe. It was like a lighter-than-custard but heavier than foam texture, definitely tasting of pistachios, also a good choice.

Pistachio Cream Crepe

Comptoir des Crepes isn't very fancy but it serves good food at reasonable prices and is a good option if you're searching for crepes. It was a fitting ending to our sojourn in Paris before we headed back to London for our last day of vacation.