She Bakes and Cooks

Today I had so much energy. I made scones for breakfast, skillet pizza for lunch, and for dinner:  chicken pot pie with home made biscuits,  and for dessert, buttermilk spice cake with pear compote and crème fraîche. I also baked a Golden Almond Butter Cake for school tomorrow.

I added a dollop of St. Dalfour's strawberry jam on the plate. The scones were light, moist, and a tad too flat. The recipe is for 8 scones but I got 12. I had rolled out the dough to 1/2 inch thickness so I recommend patting it flat, rather than rolling it,  to 1 inch thickness then cutting it into rounds.

We invited Robert and Anne to dinner to try this new recipe for Quick Chicken Pot Pie. I felt confident because this recipe comes from America's Test Kitchen, and I haven't been disappointed so far. This recipe is supposed to be "quick" because of the refrigerator biscuits, store-bought rotisserie chicken, and the frozen veggies. But of course, there aren't any refrigerator biscuits in Bangkok so I made my own. Andy bought a whole freshly roasted chicken from Five Star. I adjusted this recipe by adding to the onion, 2 tablespoons minced fresh garlic, 2 cups fresh chopped okra instead of the prohibitively expensive celery, and 2 cups diced carrots. The biscuit, I realized, is really a savory scone to be eaten with hearty stews and thick soups like this pot pie.

The pièce de résistance! This is Bon Appetit's buttermilk spice cake with pear compote and crème fraîche. Making the crème fraîche with a hand mixer took 5 long minutes.  Just think of the muscles I'm developing. On my first attempt at the cake I made the silliest mistake: I forgot to flour the pan before lining it. The bottom fell out of the cake as I was unmolding it. The taste was warm and spicy but there were a good number of holes in the batter due to overmixing. The second time around, the cake was light and delicate; the texture had a fine moist crumb--nearly perfect! The spices were faintly detectable, not overpowering at all. It could be the spices are losing their flavor. In this heat, everything needs to be refrigerated. Sigh.

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Midweek Meal: Skillet Chicken with Rigatoni, Broccoli, Tomatoes

Thursday night and I'm looking for an easy dinner recipe. How about a one pot meal? This one is adapted from America's Test Kitchen's Skillet Chicken, Broccoli, Ziti and Asiago Cheese. I didn't have sun-dried tomato so I substituted fresh tomatoes, seeded and sliced into strips. No ziti so I used rigatoni. Andy wasn't too enamored of the rigatoni and I'm inclined to agree with him. Next time I'll use penne if ziti isn't available. I didn't have any heavy cream either so I used milk. No Asiago so I used a mixture of cheddar and Gouda. In other words, I used whatever was on hand in my pantry and refrigerator!


Ingredients

1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into 1-inch squares

table salt and ground black pepper

2 tablespoons vegetable oil (or olive oil)

1 medium onion , minced (about 1 cup)

3 medium cloves garlic , minced (I love garlic so I added twice the amount)

1/4 teaspoon dried oregano

1/8 teaspoon red pepper flakes

8 ounces ziti or penne (2 /12 cups)

2 3/4 cups water

1 2/3 cups low-sodium chicken broth

12 ounces broccoli florets (4 cups)

1/4 cup oil-packed sun-dried tomatoes , rinsed and chopped coarse

1/2 cup heavy cream

1 ounce grated asiago cheese or parmesan cheese(1/2 cup), plus extra for serving

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

Preparation

1. Season the chicken with salt and pepper. Heat 1 tablespoon of the oil in a 12-inch nonstick skillet over medium-high heat until just smoking. Add the chicken in a single layer and cook for 1 minute without stirring. Stir the chicken and continue to cook until most, but not all, of the pink color has disappeared and the chicken is lightly browned around the edges, 1 to 2 minutes longer. Transfer the chicken to a clean bowl and set aside.

2. Add the remaining tablespoon of oil, onion, and 1/2 teaspoon salt to the skillet. Return the skillet to medium-high heat and cook, stirring often, until the onion is softened, 2 to 5 minutes. Stir in the garlic, oregano, and pepper flakes, and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds.

3. Add the ziti, 2 cups of the water, and the broth. Bring to a boil over high heat and cook until the liquid is very thick and syrupy and almost completely absorbed, 12 to 15 minutes.

4. Add the broccoli, sun-dried tomatoes, and the remaining 3/4 cup water. Cover, reduce the heat to medium, and cook until the broccoli turns bright green and is almost tender, 3 to 5 minutes.

5. Uncover and return heat to high. Stir in the cream, Asiago, and reserved chicken broth.Simmer uncovered until the sauce is thickened and the chicken is cooked and heated through, 1-2 minutes. Turn off the heat. Stir in the lemon juice and season with salt and pepper to taste. Serve, passing more Asiago cheese at the table, if desired.