Arroz Con Pollo: It's Not That Hard!

UPDATE: I realize I did not put the rice on the chalk board! You will need 2 cups of rice for the "arroz" part of the dish!

I love stews and braised meats, especially once the weather dips below 73 degrees in Southern California. This past weekend when our temperatures dipped and the breeze kicked up I was hankering for dinner in a pot. Sunday I made arroz con pollo. There are many variations on this classic dish, the one below is very simple and you can easily add your own extra ingredients to change the dish to your family's tastes.

The prep for this takes about half an hour, most of it spent browning your chicken. Before you start cooking layout your chicken in a roasting pan or cookie sheet with edges so the juice doesn't get all over the counter. I use 10-12 thighs, if you prefer you can use a cut up chicken. I use thighs because I love the flavor of the meat and also all the pieces are the same size so they cook evenly. Don't go all healthy and skinless on this one, the skin renders and adds flavor to your dish, you can always pick it off when you eat it (heresy!).

With your chicken laid out season well on both sides with salt and pepper; I also sprinkle with small amount of cumin, cloves and red pepper. Leave the chicken out until room temperature before browning. Not all day, but about half hour before you are going to start cooking.

In a dutch oven or heavy bottom pot pour about a quarter cup of vegetable or canola oil, I also add about 2-3 tablespoons of butter. Put the pot on medium heat and bring to temperature. Then depending on the size of your cooking vessel place 3, 4 or 5 pieces in the oil, I always start skin side down. You do not want to crowd the pan so the chicken pieces should not be touching if possible, if it takes your 3 or 4 rounds to brown all the chicken so they can have room then take the time you will be rewarded with beautifully browned chicken.

Brown the chicken about 5 minutes and then turn and brown about 5 more minutes. When your skin/meat has a nice brown color and starting to get dark in some areas you are good. Take out the chicken and set in a dish that will hold the juices. (Here I squirt a little fresh lime juice over the chicken I just took out of the browning pot). Repeat with your remaining chicken until all your pieces are browned and in the holding dish (again each time you pull chicken out try a squirt of some fresh lime juice).

When all your chicken is finished take a look at how much oil you have left in the pot, probably more than you want, and while it is filled with flavor, you may want to pour some of it out--I always do. I discard oil until there is just enough to barely cover the bottom of the pan.

While the chicken is browning dice 1 onion, brown, red, white, your choice; and several cloves of garlic.

Once your chicken is out of the pot and your have discarded any oil you are discarding turn the heat to medium low and toss in your onions. As they begin to sweat use a spoon and scrape the bits off the bottom of the pan. When your onions get just closed to becoming browned pour in about a quarter cup of dry vermouth, or the white wine you didn't finish last night, or as my mom used to do open a new bottle, take a swig to make sure it tastes good, pour some in the pot and then some in a glass. Once you have the wine in raise the heat a bit and reduce for about 3-4 minutes.

Time for everyone to go swimming! Add your 2 cups of rice, chopped garlic and can of black beans--do not drain toss all the juices in. At this point you can add: canned tomatoes, olives, carrots, celery, diced chilis, cooked sausage, whatever you want. I go simple just rice, beans and garlic.

Once they are all in give a couple of stirs and mix everything up. Now add your chicken pieces, and pour in all the juice that is in the dish.

When the chicken is in pour in about 1 1/2 cups of chicken broth or stock (if you make your own and save this is a good time to break it out). I say about 1 1/ 2 cups because it depends on how much liquid is in the in the other ingredients you added, you want a total of about 2 cups liquid so if you add can of beans with liquid, can of tomatoes with liquid, can of olives with liquid, you will want to back down to about 1 cup of liquid maybe. But if you are going to error do so on the side of too much liquid rather than too little.

Once the liquid is in cover and bring to temperature so liquid is bubbling on the sides of the pot, a heavy simmer. Turn the heat down to a simmer and walk away for about half an hour.

You're done, arroz con pollo for dinner! You can serve from the pot or put in a casserole or on a platter with the chicken spread over the bed of rice. This feeds quite a few, the advantage in our home is that there is plenty of left overs I can bring to lunch and get jealous looks from my co-workers!

Arroz con Pollo sounds fancy, sounds difficult, sounds intimidating. But as you can see it is really simple: brown some chicken and toss in some ingredients, simmer and serve!

Faux Cinnamon Rolls

This is a very adaptable recipe where the filling can be changed for different meals and types of rolls. See bottom for other variations. I came across this idea while reading Food and Wine magazine at Jenna's soccer practice.

First you need a biscuit recipe. There are plenty on the web, I use the Joy of Cooking (click for recipe) and use butter instead of shortening/lard. By the way, the Joy of Cooking is the one essential I would have to have in any kitchen. Basic recipes that you can change and adapt to your tastes, or use as a text book to learn how to cook--that is what my mom did in the 1950's to learn how to cook and by the time I came around she was a great cook.

So make your biscuits using your favorite recipe, you can even use the one on the back of the Bisquik box for quick simple way to bang these out. Using the JOC recipe, as I said I use the butter and bring the mixture together in food processor to save time, they come out great.

Once you have your biscuit dough roll it out so it is about 1/2 inch think and somewhat resembles a square. Liberally brush the dough with melted butter, about 2 tablespoons.

Here comes the fun part, the filling.

Combine brown sugar and cinnamon in a bowl. How much? Depends on your taste. I use about half a cup of brown sugar and about a tablespoon of cinnamon.

Spread the brown sugar mixture evenly on the dough. Options! You like nuts? Add some crushed walnut, pecans, almonds on top of the mixture. You like raisins? Add some raisins to the top of the mixture? Apples? Finely dice an apple and spread over the mixture. Go nuts, or raisins, here and add flavors your family enjoys.

When you are finished with your mixture starting at the edge closest to you carefully and tightly roll the dough. When you are finished crimp the seam.

Grab your muffin tin. Melt about two tablespoons of butter and divide into each of your muffin tin spots (is there a technical term?). Then pour a little maple syrup into each one, or if you prefer add some brown sugar and cinnamon. When finished your are going to flip the rolls out and what ever you have on the bottom of the tin will/should coat the top and drip down the sides of the rolls. Once your muffin tins are covered on the bottom with butter and syrup or brown sugar mix next and final step.

Slice your roll into equal sizes, if you have 12 cup muffin tin make 12 slices; if you have 9 cup tin make 9 slices. Place your cut rolls into the tins with the swirling side down and up. Bake according to your recipe, about 12-15 minutes depending on your oven.

When finished turn the muffin tin out on a baking sheet (put baking sheet on top of muffin tin, hold muffin tin, with pot holder!, on the bottom in the palm of one hand, place the palm of other hand on top of baking sheet, push together and then flip so muffin tin on top.) Since we have the sypup in the tin some may stick a bit--that's good! So extract with care as the tins are hot.

These are delicious and ready to serve.

Okay VARIATIONS!

Cheeseburger rolls: for filling brown some ground sirloin, put on your dough, sprinkle with cheese, go wild: smoked gouda? parmesian? just cheddar? Roll and slice. Bake and you have mini cheeseburgers.

Barbecue rolls: Have left over pork or beef from your barbecue? Spread some of your favorite barbecue sauce on the dough, cover with shredded pork or beef. Spice it up with some diced chili peppers. Roll it, slice it, put some of your barbecue sauce in the bottom of your muffin tins before adding the rolls.

Pizza rolls: Cover your rolled out dough with tomato sauce and mozarella, add some cooked off italian sausage or pepporoni, or go Hawaiian with ham and pineapple. Before slicing roll your roll in parmesian to coat the outside, then slice and put into the muffin tins.

Because biscuits are self-rising the effect of this recipe is to make a cinnamon type roll without having to go through the lengthy process of making dough, waiting for it to rise, knocking down and rolling out, filling, then waiting for the 2nd rise and then baking. This recipe can be knocked out in about half an hour including cooking time. Simple to make before church on Sunday morning or if using savory fillings as a quick fun dinner or appetizer on a school night.

Tell me what variations you come up with!

E-Z P-Z Pasta N Chee-Z

Growing up I hated Macaroni and Cheese. The dislike stayed with me well into my adult years. Our youngest daughter could live on Mac and Cheese, the oranger the better. Having made hundreds of batches from the box I started doing what I always do, thinking "how can I make this better? What can I do to make it so I would like it?" It dawned on me that the oneness of the flavor and the texture were the two things that I disliked. After watching a Bobby Flay throw down on mac and cheese I decided to give my own version a whirl.

This is very simple to make and takes about 20 minutes start to finish. There are many options along the way where you can substitute, add or leave out ingredients. What I am presenting is how I like to make it, though depending on my audience I will add or subtract heat, types of cheese, type of pasta and cream to milk ratio.

Have fun, it's Easy Peasy!

Start by making your pasta. You can use traditional macaroni noodles, mostaccioli, large shells, small shells, I have used Orzo which gives a really creamy, almost risotto like in texture with the bits of bacon and pepper giving it texture. Depending on how you intend to serve the dish choose a pasta and prepare it at the start. Have it ready to add to the sauce.

I do not measure so you may have to play with some of the amounts to get it the way you like. This dish sets up pretty well so while it may look like you have too much sauce to pasta, if it sits for a bit the proportions tend to even out. Here we go.

Take 4-6 slices of bacon, do not separate to save time, and slice into chunks about quarter to half inch in lenth. Add to saucepan and put on medium to medium-low heat. The objective is to get the bacon to become crispy. Do not cook too fast as you will be adding additional ingredients and do not want to take bacon from crispy to crunchy. Stir from time to time to break up the pieces and also to prevent sticking.

Dice about 1 cup of onion--you can use any type of onion. Depending on your personal heat index dice an jalepeno or Anaheim chili, should be about a half to one cup. When the bacon is just getting crispy, five minutes?, add the onion and peppers.

At this point I start to add some seasoning and will add salt, pepper, some ground red pepper--maybe a half teaspoon or more--and a couple of dashes of ground nutmeg or a couple of grinds of fresh nutmeg. Feel free to add additional spices you like.

After the onions and peppers have sweated and the bacon appears to be crispy we get to the heavy action part. Have the following ingredients ready to go: flour, wine (about half cup) and cream/milk. Regarding the cream and milk, this is where you can make substitution, I have made this with about 1 cup of each and with about half cup of cream and 1 to one and a half cups of milk. The milk in our home is 2%. You can also make this with no cream but the texture of the sauce may be a bit different.

With the bacon/onion/pepper mixture still on medium heat slowly add flour. Do not drain the bacon fat, just add the flour. I use about two to three of our big soup spoons, so maybe 4 tablespoons measured. When I add flour to sauces I always put the flour through our sieve and bang the side with the spoon to sift the flour over the top of the mixture. After the top of the bacon mix is covered with flour I stir to incoporate the flour and then sift more flour on top until covered and then mix in, repeating until I have added enough flour to make it begin to thicken.

Now comes the fun part. Slowly add your wine. You will notice that the mixture immediately siezes up and becomes balls of wet flour with bacon, etc. Stir this and slowly keep adding the wine. After you have added the wine give it some stirs. It may be time to switch to your whisk if you have not done so already.

Now quickly add your cream, if you are using it, and whisk thoroughly. You will see the roux that you made begin to disolve and a sauce begin. Then add your milk and continue to whisk. Keep on the heat, whisking the mixture. Use your whisk to scrape the bottom of the pan as you go. When the mixture comes up to a slow simmer (bubbles on the side of the pan) lower the heat to low and add your cheese.

Cheese This is where you can really change the flavor of this dish. I have used a mix of fontina, parmesian and cheddar, and had a very strong flavor that kids did not like and adults did. I have used fontina, smoked gouda and cheddar for a bit more mild that kids like as well. Just cheddar. Some day I will try it with blue cheese in the mix. This is where you can have some fun and really experiment on how you make it. Keep in mind that it does not take much of a strong flavored cheese to permeate a dish.

Have ready about 2-3 cups of grated cheese. When using a couple of different cheeses I will go half cup of the "strong" cheeses and one cup of the basic cheddar (white or orange).

With your now creamy, bacony, flavorful sauce add your grated cheese and stir until all the cheese is melted and integrated. Turn off the heat.

Toss in your pasta and mix throughly. If you are using pasta with "holes" like macaroni, or even shells, give it a good stirring/folding to ensure you have all the pasta filled with the sauce.

As for serving you can pour the pasta into a baking dish, cover with grated cheese and bake at 350 for a while or toss under a broiler to get the crunchy top many like. Or simply put in a bowl and set out.

While the directions are rather lengthy, once you make this dish you will find how easy it really is to put together. As I said you can really do many variations of heat with the peppers or spices, flavors with the cheese, try adding crumbled sausage or pancetta. There is no end of variations!

And oh the cheesy, creamy, bacony, goodness you will enjoy!