Water Bath Ground Chicken

Steaming, grilling, baking, pan frying, if there's a way to cook something we've probably tried it. One method we don't use often, however, is the water bath. Different from simply boiling, a water bath is done when a meat is wrapped in a material - like plastic wrap - and then cooked in boiling water so it retains its form.

Recently we decided to try making some spicy chicken rolls in a water bath. Here we've taken ground chicken and mixed it with chopped onion, garlic powder, garlic salt, and lots of crushed red pepper for a spicy kick.

Megan spoons out some of the mixture onto plastic wrap and then rolls them up so they are uniform in shape.

We then set them in a pot of boiling water and let them cook. This changes the overall texture, and prevents us from having to use oil or butter while cooking.

When they were done we decided we wanted a bit more flavor however, so we briefly cooked them in homemade barbecue sauce for extra flavor on the stovetop.

After a minute or two on each side we've got amazingly flavored chicken rolls ready to hit our plates.

We wanted quick sides, so we did broccoli and stuffing, these would be great topping rice, mashed potatoes, or even pasta instead. You could also switch the BBQ sauce with tomato, alfredo, or an Asian sauce for a different flavor.

Fourth of July Nacho Pretzel Dogs

This year we've been making an effort to try different things for the holiday meals, and the 4th of July seemed like a great chance to try out something outside our usual repertoire. Grilling is of course a must, but we put an indoor twist on our hot dogs - by making our own pretzel roll buns!

Our homemade pretzels first showed up a couple of years back when we had pretzels at the mall that were pretty unsatisfying. We played around with recipes until finding our perfect combination and had quite a few fun nights rolling out pretzels and dipping them in cheese, marinara sauce, and so on. Eventually we figured these deliciously soft snacks would be amazing for sandwiches, so we started making pretzel roll buns.

Taking that idea a step further, we decided to put together pretzel roll hot dog buns. We have our own recipe we use, but if you'd like a great starting point, you can find a ridiculously highly rated mall style pretzel recipe at this location.

Putting these together isn't too tough, starting off simply by mixing together standard dry ingredients.

Next goes in the wet ingredients and fast acting yeast, at which point it has to sit and rise for a short time.

Once that's done, we get to the actual work: kneading the dough for around 8 - 10 minutes.

After the kneading process, Megan cut the dough into equal portions and rolled them into the approximate length of our hot dogs instead of into the standard pretzel shapes.

As a final step before baking, each bun is dipped briefly in a baking soda water solution.

Finally they get topped in a sprinkling of coarse kosher salt and baked until perfect golden brown!

These are amazing because they are a little crispy on the outside, but tender and fluffy all throughout the center.

Before baking, Megan cut a slit down the center so they'd be easier to pull open and fill with delicious hot dogs and toppings.

Next up we've got to actually get started grilling our hot dogs...but what's in that other pouch there?!?!

Here's our bun-length all beef dogs getting some nice heat marks over our charcoal grill.

As a fun addition, we decided to make a grilled desert as well. Here Megan is flipping over some pound cake we're also cooking on the grill.

Once all the grilling is done it's time to start putting together the hot dogs, starting by cooking and slicing up some bacon.

Here I've pulled open one of the buns and torn out a bit of the insides - which of course I dipped into nacho cheese to chow down on!

That's not mustard there - it's delicious molten gold, otherwise known as nacho cheese sauce! Throw caution into the wind and ladle on as much as you can handle, or as much as you'd care to end up having to wipe off your face and plate later.

Sprinkle on as much bacon as you think your dog needs - which is probably quite a lot!

Here's Megan's finished dog, filled to the brim with awesome cheese and bacon. For a fun twist you could also do relish or any number of other toppings - sauerkraut, thousand island, onions, etc.

After chowing down on our dogs and watching the fireworks, we put together our deserts - grilled pound cake covered in sliced strawberries and topped with whipped cream.

Pesto Pizzas

Making our own pizzas at home has been a tradition in our little family since Megan and I first met years ago, and we usually end up rolling out some dough for a delicious baked pizza at least every few weeks.

After the fruit detour of our spicy strawberry chicken pizza we wanted to return more towards the main highway of pizza making, but with a few unexpected twists and turns still of course! Recently we tried mixing up sauces by using both tomato and pesto on the same pie. This particular experiment also utilized  fresh basil from our indoor herb garden (which will get its own blog entry in the near future).

We start by making our standard pizza dough and regular tomato sauce (which have both been covered in many blogs past). Things start simple enough with a traditional focus - shredded mozzarella and thin sliced tomato.

Here's where the twist happens though - Megan spoons on dollops of pesto all across the pizza almost like it's another topping. You could of course also simply mix the pesto with the tomato sauce for an even spread, but this was more visually appealing and would create a stronger contrast between the flavors.

The pizza pops in the oven, and then when it has about 4 or 5 minutes left we picked some fresh basil leaves from our garden and layered them on top.

Pop the pizza back in the oven so the basil just gets a quick cook through. If you want a more striking visual presentation and a bigger contrast, you could skip the cooking aspect and just toss the leaves on after the baking is completely done instead.

After a few minutes to cool I pull out the pizza cutter and slice off the first piece!

This was one of the tastiest pizzas we've ever done, and it will definitely be joining our regular rotation from now on out!

Another fun pizza experiment we tried lately used two different twists - wheat flour and a different sauce. Here we've put together our regular crust, but used wheat instead of white flour, which changes up both the texture and taste. It probably wouldn't be appropriate for every pizza type, but for this one it worked quite well and was a fun change of pace.

Instead of our usual sauce options - tomato, alfredo, ranch, etc. - we used some creamy pesto flavored Philadelphia cooking creme. We occasionally use these in place of other sauces as they regularly go on clearance for a dollar or more off the regular price at Smiths.

As with the last pizza, we're starting off our topping extravaganza with mozzarella and tomato slices.

We're going into veggie overdrive on this one however, adding on sliced mushrooms and whole garlic cloves. You may recall we first tried out using whole garlic cloves as a pizza topping nearly three years ago now after taking our Portland trek.

For another layer of cheesy awesome, Megan also coated everything in Paremsan cheese.

Here's the crispy wheat crust pizza fresh out of the oven:

This one was another success, with lots of delicious savory flavors and a mix of ingredients you don't normally see on the average pizza.

Chicken Biscuit Breakfast

Last year we covered a pretty wide range of mouth watering morning meals - from breakfast sandwiches to the always amazing breakfast burrito, along with those times we revisited breakfast and even revisited it again just because breakfast is so awesome.

This year our focus has been more on grilling and trying completely new types of cuisine, but today we'll head back to breakfast land for a deliciously savory meal inspired by a Perkins menu option: breaded chicken on hand made biscuits with gravy and breakfast potatoes.

For our version, we're using frozen tenderloins leftover from our grilled chicken skewers dinner, but you could also get breasts or tenderloins from the butcher block instead.

This meal was rather spur of the moment, and this particular morning we were out of some of the regular ingredients and only had whole wheat flour on hand, which made our biscuit creation options limited. We found an offbeat recipe using whole wheat flour and the sweetener Stevia and decided to give it a shot. Here's our ingredients:

First we mix together all the dry ingredients:

Then we pour in the milk and mix until it's smooth and ready to be rolled out:

Here we're using the edge of a drinking glass to form our biscuits.

Next up we put together the breakfast potatoes, which are just regular potatoes cut into wedges and dredged in garlic powder, cayenne, pepper, and any other seasonings you care to add.

Next up we prepare the meat by making a flour and herb blend and an egg bath to coat the chicken tenderloins.

The chicken is dipped in the herb blend, dredged in the egg, and then returned to the herb blend again for maximum coating.

Everything goes in the oven for 30 - 40 minutes while Megan whips up some scrambled eggs and homemade gravy, which is a snap if you've got milk, flour, and whatever flavoring you'd like to us - leftover meat pan drippings are the best, but you could even go with meat stock cubes or ramen flavoring packets if you've got nothing else on hand. Pour the gravy on top, dash on as much tabasco as you need on your scrambled eggs, and dig in! Don't forget a steaming mug of coffee though :)

Next time we make this we'll probably go with a traditional biscuit recipe instead, as these were a bit too sweet for this type of meal, but they were great later with honey or jam.

Check back in again soon as we try more interesting pizza recipes, show off our indoor herb garden from construction to cultivation, and continue the 2013 grilling season!

Chicken On A Stick

Every summer there are a few events we look forward to: our anniversary (seven years in 2013!), going to an annual pool party with our buddy Cristal, and heading down to the local farmer's market on Saturday mornings.

There's lots of great things at the farmer's market, but recently we had some grilled chicken on a stick at a food vendor that was pretty disappointing. There wasn't much flavor, and the meat was dry instead of tender and juicy.

We knew immediately we would have to make our own to get rid of that disappointment and replace it with some homemade awesome! To make our grilled chicken on a stick, we started by putting together our own marinade: teriyaki sauce, soy sauce, Kraft's Asian toasted sesame "anything" sauce, and the juice of one fresh lemon.

Everything gets mixed together with a whisk. If you want to go spicy, throw in some crushed red pepper or sriracha sauce. For sweeter, you could do brown sugar. Other ingredient combinations could include ginger, olive oil, fish sauce, your favorite BBQ sauce, or just about anything you can imagine that would taste good on the grill.

Toss your chicken tenderloins into a plastic bag, pour in the marinade, and shake vigorously. Toss the bag in the fridge and turn it over every 20 minutes or so until you're ready to grill. To be fair to the farmer's market vendor, we even used the same chicken - the 5 lb. frozen bag kind instead of fresh chicken from the butcher's block.

Of course we aren't just going to be eating chicken, there's got to be a load of colorful veggies too! Here we're seasoning sliced squash, zucchini, red bell pepper, and asparagus.

After a few hours, our chicken gets stabbed by wooden skewers (be sure to soak them in cold water beforehand so they don't burn on the grill).

Here's our seasoned vegetables (coated with some olive oil) and peaches cut into quarters which will add a fun fruit element to our meal.

Now we're finally ready to get everything cooking, using a screen to make sure the vegetables don't fall through the grill onto the coals.

Here's our chicken getting a nice char on one side before we get ready to turn and coat it with more sauce.

Megan is brushing the turned chicken with more sauce - but be sure not to just use the leftover marinade, since it's been soaking in raw chicken for hours. If you want to use the marinade, you have to boil it on the stove first, which is what Megan did, also adding in some balsamic vinegar and strawberry jam for some sweet notes.

After the chicken is done we toss on the peaches (skin side up, as you don't want the skin to burn) and let them get a bit of char.

Here's our delicious finished chicken skewers!

The chicken skewers are piled on a bed of rice, and then we spoon on some of those amazing grilled fruits and vegetables.

Needless to say, ours turned out fantastic! Juicy, tender, and amazingly flavorful. We'll definitely be making these again in the future!