autumn
Chicken Pot Pie
Using trimmed chicken thighs and herbs de Provence with lavender kicks up the flavor of this classic for a modern twist without ramping up the calories in kind. Sure, it’s called “Chicken Pot Pie”, but in these parts it’s known as CHICKEN POT AWESOME.
Ingredients
1 lb boneless, skinless chicken thighs trimmed of any excess fat and cut into 1″ chunks
3/4 cup roughly chopped carrots
2/3 cup frozen peas
2/3 cup frozen corn
1 cup chopped mushrooms (“Optional,” my husband says. They’re not.)
1 cup chopped celery or fennel (I prefer the fennel)
1/3 cup butter
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 clove garlic, minced
4 tsp kosher salt, divided
2 tsp black pepper, divided
1 1/2 tsp herbs de Provence (if you can get it with lavender it’s better)
1/3 cup flour
1 1/4 cup low sodium chicken broth
1/2 cup dry white wine
2/3 cups milk
2 9″ frozen pie crusts or pie dough
Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
Roll you pie dough into a deep casserole pan, leaving enough to top the pot pie if using. If you are going with 2 pie crusts, one will be your bottom and the other will be used for the top. I used pre-made pie crust in the aluminum pans, but turned one out and pressed it into my oval casserole pan, while rolling out the other for the top and it just worked fine.
In a medium pot heat 1/2 TBSP vegetable oil and combine chicken, carrots, peas, corn, mushrooms, and celery or fennel. Sprinkle with 2 tsp salt and 1 tsp black pepper, and sauté over medium heat for about 6 minutes. Carefully add enough water to cover chicken and veggies, leaning away so steam doesn’t hit you in the face. Crank heat to high, cover, and boil for 10 minutes. Drain and set aside. This step can be done as much as a day in advance if need be. Simply store in an airtight container in the fridge and take out about 30 minutes before you’re ready to assemble the pie.
In a bowl or large measuring cup, mix the wine, broth, and milk. In a saucepan over medium heat cook the onions and garlic in the butter until soft. You don’t want these to brown. Mix in the remaining salt and pepper, and herbs, toasting a little while, stirring for an additional 1-2 minutes. Add the flour, followed by one fourth of the liquid mixture. Stir until incorporated. Continue mixing the liquid in batches, stirring until incorporated each time. Once the liquid is well mixed and smooth with the onions, garlic, and herbs, let slightly thicken an additional couple of minutes (should coat the back of a spoon). Remove from heat.
Pour the chicken and veggie mixture into the bottom pie crust. Pour the liquid flour-onion mixture over the top of the chicken, letting it move down and around every thing. Cover this deliciousness with the top crust, sealing the edges with the tines of a fork or your fingers. Cut 4 or 5 vents in the top about 1 inch long to allow steam to escape while baking. If you’re feelin’ fancy (and that’s okay) you can use extra pie dough to make a design on top or whisk an egg with 2 TBSP water for an egg wash to brush on for an extra shiny golden crust.
Bake for 34 – 38 minutes until the top is nice and golden brown and the insides are bubbling hot. Allow to cool 10-15 minutes before serving. We didn’t bother to serve ours with a side of anything, though I suppose mashed potatoes might be the norm or sautéed spinach might be good. The fact of the matter is any other food would simply detract from the pie, and who wants that? No one, that’s who.
Autumn Frying By: Back Yard Gastro Graze
What, oh what, does one do with a turkey fryer once Thanksgiving is past $60 worth of oil?
Well, if you’re part of my group of friends, you set out to discover what can and can’t be fried.
The Frying Rig.
For safety’s sake, my friends took a direct page from Alton Brown’s book and setup their fryer outside, away from the house, spending about $5 to have the fry basket on a pulley, and wrapping the hose in tinfoil so that in the event of a spill, the hot oil won’t melt through the propane hose.
The weather was cool, the colors bright, every one felt good in the throws of Austin Autumn.
While some planning had to go into what we fried (wet batter that could drip and therefore be more likely to cause burnt bits that would blacken the oil), we started ambitiously with hot wings followed by Brussel sprouts, both fried at 350F degrees. The hot wings were tossed in regular buffalo sauce and Texas Pete Sweet & Fiery, a new favorite of mine. The Brussel sprouts took less than 3 minutes and were amazing both simply salted and sprinkled with Uchiko’s recipe.
Following our bounty of protein and veggie tables, we moved to a pallet cleansing batch of fried baguette crust, cut into strips, dipped into Nutella and served with banana slices. This was particularly satisfying.
Not everything was a success, however. We did attempt a batch of fried cheese curds, that came out more like puffs of hollow crispy shells. They also coated the basket in goo, and we had to break from frying to scrub everything and make sure the oil wasn’t going to burn do to particles.
I had mixed up a batch of green chile biscuit dough, rolled into balls, and stuffed each ball with a small cube of cheese and two drops of chile oil. These were tasty, but needed more seasoning than I mixed into the dough. A good start on something, though, and they were even better the next day, making me think they may need to be a breakfast treat!
Up next were the corn dogs and, while I only got one bite, they were easily my favorite of the afternoon. And it goes without saying that they disappeared the fastest, loved by adults, kids, and X-1.
X knows where the good stuff is…
But the day wasn’t just about getting together to eat unnecessary calories. We learned, we taught each other, we enjoyed the sunshine. The was quality time…
“Quality” time of the future.
We taught Nicco how to use the horn on her Batmobile and how to make deep “Tooooooot” train sounds with an empty bottle. We chatted and allowed the kids to exhaust us, using the adults and trees as jungle gyms.
And what would an afternoon be without dessert, a dessert that appreciates Autumn’s bounty of apples, of course?! The amazing Tania whipped up two different kinds of fried apple pie, one in pie crust, and one in a simple biscuit dough, as recommended by Paula Deen. We were somewhat surprised to find that Deen’s dough was far lighter and more substantial (and far less greasy) than the simple pie dough! Both were dipped in a fantastic caramel sauce from Austin’s own Foreign & Domestic.
It was an afternoon of ease, experimentation, humor, good company, beautiful weather, and joy. It was a second Thanksgiving Day, it was perfect for a Sunday in Autumn. One final note: we did eventually get the cheese curds to come out better…though not all together perfect. When Sarah wanted to get a few more, her husband, not standing too far from the curds said “Well, kick the dog, drop the baby, and get over here!” rather than leave the table himself, because they were disappearing all too fast. (Yes, of course he was kidding! But it’s a funny picture non-the-less.)
Reverse Reese’s: Chocolate Stuffed Peanut Butter Cookies!
Okay, life has been so stressful and overwhelming lately, that I’ve gotten away from the fun things. I have only been to the gym twice this week, I’ve barely been eating (let alone eating well), and I’ve allowed what brings me joy to be pushed away by things that already deserve less of my time than I give them.
So today I am reclaiming my life just for me: I went to the gym this morning, had a light and bright brunch, cleaned my house while my hubby did laundry, carved a pumpkin and NOW I’m going to make some peanut butter cookies!
My Jack Skellington Jack-O-Lantern
Chip looooooves peanut butter cookies, but I find them to often be salty and lacking…probably because they don’t have any chocolate in them. Well, I’m changing that today, dammit. This afternoon I’ll be making what I call a Reverse Reese’s, that is I peanut butter cookie stuffed with chocolate. 1. Are these healthy? No. 2. Do I care? See the answer to the first question.
Reverse Reese’s Peanut Butter Chocolate Cookies
1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1/2 cup peanut butter (Smooth or crunchy. I use smooth, because, like a child, I think crunchy is gross.)
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/4 cups flour (You want to sift it? What are you, an over-acheiver?)
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt (Optional. I find there’s enough salt in the peanut butter that this isn’t necessary.) 1 cup Ghirardelli Bittersweet Chocolate Chips
Use Jiff peanut butter. Or Peter Pan. Or your local grocery store’s generic brand. I know, I know, these are processed, but it’s much harder to get the correct consistency both before and after cooking if you use something organic that often separates. Also, spritz your measuring cup with a little non-stick spray so your peanut butter doesn’t wind up being obnoxious to get out of there. Whip together the butter, peanut butter, sugars, and vanilla. Incorporate the egg. Sprinkle in the flour with your mixer on low in 2-3 batches. Add the baking soda and salt if using, and mix for an additional 30 seconds. or until everything is well combined. It will pull cleanly away from the sides of your bowl when complete.
If your kitchen is warm or it’s a hot day, stick the dough in the fridge for 5-10 minutes. Preheat your oven to 350 (F). Use this time to clean up. I gave my KitchenAid mixer a good cleaning, tossed most stuff in the sink and wiped down the counter. My KitchenAid is my dream boat, which I inherited from my grandmother. It’s from the 70’s, just look at the plug on the thing, and it works like a champ! Love. It.
Once your dough is ready, take a heaping tablespoon of the peanut butter goodness and flatten in the palm of your hand. Smoosh (that’s the medical term) 8-10 chocolate chips into the center and fold the dough over and seal. Try and keep the chocolate chips in a cluster in the center if you want a Reverse Reese’s. Worst case scenario is you wind up with chocolate chip peanut butter cookies, so you can’t really mess this up. Place on a cookie sheet (these are oily enough that you don’t need to spray your pan) and gently press to about a half inch thick.
Bake for 13-16 minutes. I like mine soft and chewy, so these came out after 14 minutes. Let rest 3-5 minutes before moving off the cookies sheet because they are very delicate when they first come out.
Serve with milk and a cool Autumn night.
Guilt-Free Peach Crisp
In my 1,978 attempt to will Austin to have an Autumn, I decided to make a crisp on this abnormally cool day. I’m bored with the expected and somewhat plain sweetness that comes with a peach or apple crisp, however, and really wanted to try to make a light version. With the entire 8 X 8 inch pan containing only 3 tablespoons of butter and 1.5 tablespoons of brown sugar for “bad” fat and sweetness, I had to ramp of my peach crisp’s flavor in terms of spices.
And the whole reason I made this a peach crisp was because I was too lazy to go out and get apples.
Guilt-Free Peach Crisp
3 large Peaches, about 5 cups of slices cut 1/4 inch thick (skin on)
1 TBSP flour, plus 2 tsps
1/2 cup oats
3 TBSP cold butter, cut roughly into 1/2 inch cubes
1 1/2 tsp Pumpkin Pie Spice, divided
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 tsp white pepper (you can use black if need be)
1/4 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp salt, divided
3 TBSP red wine (I used a Pinot Noir)
Preheat your oven to 375. Spray an 8″ x 8″ with nonstick cooking spray. Layout a single layer of peach slices; it’s fine if the edges over lap. Lightly sprinkle about a teaspoon of flour, 1/4 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon of pumpkin spice over this layer. They shouldn’t be completely or evenly covered, just a scattered sprinkling will do. Add another 2 layers of peach slices. My peaches made roughly 3 layers, filling in holes here and there where needed. You don’t want to merely stack the slices on top of each other, but you should stagger them, making sure there are no gaps. On the top layer, sprinkle another teaspoon of flour and 1/4 teaspoon of salt.
In a bowl, combine the oats, butter, brown sugar, ginger, pepper, nutmeg, vanilla, and remaining flour and pumpkin pie spice. I found the best way to do this was with my fingers, mashing everything together until everything had formed small clumps. Sprinkle these clumps as evenly as possible over the top of the layered peach slices. Bake the crisp on the center rack for 25 minutes.
After 25 minutes in the oven, drizzle the 3 tablespoons of red wine over the top of the peaches. This will mingle with the peach juices, flour, and spices making a fantastic syrupy sauce by the time it’s through cooking. Continue baking an additional 15-20 minutes or until the peaches are tender and the juices are bubbling around the edges. Let the crisp cool on the counter for 10-15 minutes; this will thicken the sauce as well.
With only 372 calories and 27 grams of fat from the brown sugar and butter in the entire pan, this winds up being a very guilt-free dessert. This means, divided into 6 large servings, it’s only 62 calories and 4.5 grams of fat from added sugar and butter! And those are big servings. You can easily get away with doing 8 servings to save even more. Yes, you can make this with sugar substitutes if need be, but as I am not diabetic, I’d rather eat the small amount of sugar and save myself from the chemicals and sodium of artificial sweeteners.
In lieu of ice cream, I served my crisp with a dollop of Chiobani Vanilla Chocolate Chip Greek Yogurt. The flavor of the wine had become delicate, but a nice noticeable addition to the usual plainly sweet crisp, and you can see all the spices in the golden syrup that it creates. The best thing about this very flavorful dessert, is that you don’t feel the need to run on a treadmill or brush the excess sugar of your teeth right after eating it. Perfect for Fall, and a great ending to a dinner party – or even as an afternoon snack of comfort food!
Butternut Squash Fries
These are a delicious alternative to sweet potato fries, saving the carbs from the potato and the fat by skipping the deep fryer. The squash contains a lot of liquid so I changed up the usual way of baking them in an attempt to dry them and crisp them up.
Butternut Squash Fries
1 Butternut Squash, peeled
2 TBSP Olive Oil
1.5 TBSP Corn Starch (optional)
1 TBSP Parmesan cheese, grated (optional)
2-3 tsp salt, divided
1 tsp pepper
1 tsp parsley
Non-Stick cooking spray (I used Pam Olive Oil, calorie & fat free)
Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Peel the squash and scoop out the seeds. Cut the squash into fries, about 1/4 inch thick. I only used 1/2 of the squash, which was made more than enough fries for my friends and me. The rest I put in a ziploc baggy to save for later in the week.
Pour the Olive Oil into a bowl and toss the squash sticks, coating them evenly, but lightly. You can skip the next step with the corn starch and Parmesan if you want truly raw or paleo fries, but the coating is minimal calorically and it adds a lot of flavor and crunch. In a separate bowl whisk together the flour and the cheese. Toss the squash fries into the Parm mixture. Layout the sticks on a cookie sheet in a even layer and sprinkle 1 tsp of the salt and the pepper onto the fries. Spray with non-stick spray. Place the sheet into the upper most rack of you oven and bake for 20 minutes. Half way through that time, flip and sprinkle with another tsp of salt. The salting helps draw out moisture.
After the 20 minutes are up, flip for fries again, and move the tray to the bottom most rack of the oven. Bake for an additional 15 – 20 minutes or until nicely browned and crisp on the outside. Remove from cookie tray and plate. Sprinkle a little more salt and the parsley on top and serve. They’re great on their own and dipped into ketchup they’re identical to sweet potato fries.
Light Pumpkin Cream Cheese Bundt Cake
I’m in Austin. It’s a million degrees out here, on this second to last day of September. But I’m continuing in my quest to will it to be Autumn. Visiting a friend for a party tonight, I decided to bring a pumpkin cake. I like pumpkin bread, but tonight I wanted something more, yet light. This recipe has no oil or butter in it and makes for an ultra moist, but not too sweet dessert that’s great for company, coffee, or a night playing Beatles Rock Band. Breaking out my bundt pan and whipping together a brown sugar cream cheese filling, I set to work making an easy, but flavorful Fall cake.
Pumpkin Spice Cake
1 box Spice Cake Mix
1 15oz can pumpkin
1.5 tsp Pumpkin Pie Spice
1 tsp nutmeg
1 3.4oz butterscotch Instant Pudding Mix
2 eggs
2 TBSP Greek Yogurt
Brown Sugar Cream Cheese Filling
12 oz. room temperature Cream Cheese
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 egg
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl, mix together the cake ingredients. The cake batter will be sticky and thick, but fluffy, almost like icing. If it’s seems too thick, sticky, or dense to stir of manipulate add another big tablespoon of yogurt. In a separate bowl, whip together the cream cheese filling ingredients and place in the fridge for a few minutes.On a side note, I tend to not like things overly sweet and to me the pumpkin cake with cream cheese brown sugar mixture is more than enough. That being said, add 2 TBSP to 1/4 cup of granulated sugar to the cake mixture if you like it as sweet as usual cakes.
Grease or spray non-stick spray in a bundt cake pan and sprinkle with flour. Scoop in roughly 1/3 to 1/2 of the batter into the pan and spread evenly, making a little indenture in the center while doing it. The cream cheese will sit in this like a circular river of deliciousness. Next remove the cream cheese mixture from the fridge and dollop it in the indentation around the cake batter as evenly as possible. Next, top the cream cheese with the remaining cake batter, being careful to cover all the exposed cream cheese. Smooth the top as best you can.
Bake for 45-55 degrees or until a tooth pick comes out clean. Let cool at least 20 minutes before flipping out of the bundt pan. Sprinkle with confectioner’s sugar, slice, and serve. It’s moist, it’s delicious, it’s low fat, low sugar, and it screams Autumn comfort!
Easy Cheesy Gourmet Drop Biscuits
The last couple of things I’ve posted here have been on the healthier side of delicious. Tonight’s contribution is also delicious, but also needless on the scale of “Healthy”. Exhausted by a million things going on that I’m going to generalize under the catch-all phrase “Life”, I decided on a summery dinner of grilled London Broil and Tomato salad filled with herbs, easy and super flavorful. But, alas, the meat was not thawed come dinner time. Or an hour after dinner time. And by the time we were actually able to start making dinner we were ravenous. Which is how I wonder up ruining our healthy protein and veggie packed dinner with buttery, cheesy biscuits.
Easy Cheesy Gourmet Drop Biscuits
2-3 large cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp salt
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp black pepper
2 TBSP minced sun dried tomatoes
1 TBSP grated or shaved parmesan
1 TBSP grated mozzarella
2 cups flour
1 TBSP baking powder
1 cup milk
1 TBSP olive oil
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) cold butter, diced
1 1/2 tsp freshly chopped basil
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees and set a rack for the upper third of the oven. Mix everything together in a bowl until a stick mass forms.
When I make biscuits, I make serious biscuits, which is the over dramatic way of saying I make them way too large. They are the Big Gulp of biscuits. I usually make 6 large biscuits, but you can make 8 or even 10. I wouldn’t go much smaller than that, though, and cooking time is affected by size. Bake 6 large biscuits for 20 minutes, 8 medium for 15 minutes, or 10 small for 10-12 minutes. The bottoms of the biscuits should be evenly golden brown and the tips of the various points on top crisp and golden as well.
This are fluffy, flavorful, moist, and a super tasty and easy addition to any meal, whether or not they have any health benefits. They are also excellent with a poached egg for breakfast!
Healthy & Light(er) Spaghetti Squash Alfredo
I love Autumn. There’s not much Fall to be had in Austin, but each and every year I try to will this season to occur. The leaves don’t chain color, unless you count the grass dying, the weather barely cools, but I still make my house smell like synthetic pumpkin, I wear layers in earth tones, and I make squash. Lots and lots of squash.
In an attempt to make squash more than a side dish, I decided to make a Spaghetti Squash Alfredo. Creamy without being heavy, filling without being packed with carbs. To lighten the sauce, I skipped the usual heavy cream, cut back on the butter, and made a roux instead.
Spaghetti Squash Alfredo
1 Spaghetti Squash
3 TBSP butter
4 TBSP all purpose flour
1/4 cup chicken stock (or dry white wine)
1/2 cup milk (I used 1%, but any will do)
2 cloves garlic, crushed or minced
1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp salt
1 tsp black pepper
Juice of 1 half lemon
1/2 TBSP dried parsley flakes or 1 TBSP freshly chopped parsley
Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Cut the spaghetti squash in half lengthwise, and scrape out the seeds. In a 4 sided cookie pan or large pyrex fill with enough water to fill about 1/4-1/2 inch up the sides. Place the squash (which at this point will look nothing like spaghetti) face down into the water. Roast the spaghetti squash for 35-45 minutes or until tender. I like my pasta al dente, so I took the squash out at 35 minutes.
The sauce comes together quickly, so make this no more than 10 minutes before the squash needs to come out. Melt the butter in a large sauce pan over medium heat. Once melted, whisk in the flour until you make a paste of even consistency. Add the milk and chicken stock or wine, whisking to incorporate. Add the garlic and let simmer for about 3 minutes, whisking periodically. Sprinkle in the parm and the garlic powder, whisking to combine. If the alfredo sauce seems to thick, add chicken stock or white wine a TBSP at a time. As it sits and simmers it will thicken, so be sure to whisk periodically. It is best, however, to make the sauce a little thick because the squash does contain a lot of liquid naturally and that will moisten the sauce once tossed together. Just before serving, whisk in the lemon juice for brightness. You can also sprinkle the lemon juice directly over the squash prior to topping with sauce if preferred.
Getting back to the squash, once done roasting, remove from cookie sheet or pyrex and let cool about 5 minutes. Wrapping the back of the squash in a tea towel (the side with the skin on it) lightly separate the innards of the squash with a fork. I stuck the tines of the fork into the squash meat and gentle twisted, revealing the meat to be spaghetti-like.
Once the squash meat is cleaned out of the skin, place your “spaghetti” into a paper towel lined colander in the sink. The one draw back to this dish is that the squash contains a lot of moisture and you want to try to remove some of that prior to serving, just so the meal doesn’t get watery. Once the sauce is done or the squash has drained a bit in the colander for 5 or so minutes, which ever comes first, place the spaghetti squash into a large bowl and toss with the sauce, reserving about 1/4 of alfredo for topping if desired. Plate topping each serving with a little extra sauce and a small sprinkling of parsley. I also topped mine with a shredded slice of prosciutto, but sautéed chicken or shrimp would also be perfect as well to add a healthy and light punch of protein. I really couldn’t detect much of a difference in flavor between the squash and regular spaghetti at all. It was a wonderfully flavorful Autumn dinner, without weighing us down, whether or not Fall was actually happening outside.
Butternut Squash Bisque
I love lobster bisque. After attempting to make it at home I decided I hate the cost of the ingredients. And cooking lobster and shrimp shells down into stock makes my home smell like low tide. Recently at a cafe in Austin I had out-of-this-world Tomato Bisque. It was truly great, much better than I ever thought it would be. If I hadn’t been eating lunch with the CEO of my company I would have totally stuck my head in that bowl and licked it clean. The thing about tomato bisque, however, is that it’s too similar to the tomato based sauces I make and it’s not Autumnish enough for me. I live in the capital of Texas, a place that – thanks to global warming – is now completely void of all seasons. There’s Lesser Summer during November through March, and then Seventh Circle of Hell Summer April through October. Take today for example. It’s November 13th and it’s 87 degrees out. Awesome. Yes, I mean that sarcastically. The leaves that have turned color have only done so because we’re experiencing a multi-year long drought and all plant matter turns brown and shrivels when it dies. There’s no romance about it.
In an attempt to relive the New England fall weather of my wasted youth, I try to make Autumn occur in other ways. I burn Apple Cinnamon candles, I hang my dust covered fall coats in easy to reach areas, I obsess over brown leather boots. And I begin a half-assed love affair with the butternut squash.
Butternut squash is….meh. It’s okay. It’s no fennel. But, you know, it tries and it’s very Fallesque. So, I decided to make Butternut Bisque.
All the recipes I read were all very sweet or too plain: Butternut Squash & Brown Sugar Bisque, Butternut Squash & Cinnamon Bisque, Mother’s Basic Butternut Bisque. I wanted something that emulated the Tomato Bisque flavor, but used Butternut squash as it’s base. So I started with bacon.
Well, that’s not entirely true. I started by roasting the squash and then half way through adding carrots to roast with said squash. One decent sized squash peeled & cubed, which made about 4 cups, and, roughly, 1 cup carrots.
Please excuse my half eaten lunch in the back round of the above picture. Austin, like most major US cities, has quite the “China Town” area and we found a little Vietnamese place that does AMAZING pork buns. So good.
I roasted the squash for 45 minutes at 500. After 25 minutes, I added the carrots. Once the 45 minutes of roasting was up, my house smelled fantastic – like Mega Fall – and my squash/carrot mixture looked like this:
I suppose I could have roasted the squash and carrots while prepping the other parts of the recipe, but I finally found the minikit detector in my Lego Star Wars video game and was just flying through levels. Once the squarrots were out of the oven, it was time to get down to business.
What makes everything better? Bacon. What makes everything even better-er? Cooking everything in bacon fat. I took 2 strips of center cut bacon, threw them in the bottom of a heavy pot and rendered the shit out of them. It looked like this:
Once I felt enough fat had cooked out of the bacon, I removed what was left of the strips. I then added 2 large, finely chopped cloves of garlic, 1 stalk of roughly chopped celery (something I’d leave out in the future, truth be told), and half of a white onion, chopped. I cooked those over medium heat until they were tender. It took about 8 minutes, so I had a cup of tea. It looked like this:
That’s my favorite mug. It was free and had some website name on it. I scraped all the letters off accept for the “O”, which I edited into a “C”, for the first letter of my married name. It’s great.
Anyway, once the other veg was tender, I sprinkled 2 tablespoons of flour over everything to help absorb all those fabulous flavors and to act like a thickening agent, stirring continuously for about three minutes. I then added only 3 cups of chicken stock. What I should have done was mixed in 2 cups chicken stock and 2 to 2 1/2 cups vegetable stock, but hindsight’s 20/20. I added the squash and carrots and let everything just hangout to reach a boil. Upon hearing the boil, I sprinted down the hall from my bedroom video game fest back to the kitchen, and I added 1 bay leaf and about 2 tablespoons of freshly chopped parsley. I turned the heat down to a simmer, and left the bisque there to think about what it had done. About 30 minutes.
Once the half hour of sensational simmering had passed, I removed the pot from the heat to let it cool.
It’s not glamorous, I know. Like in war, these are simply what the realities of making a bisque look like, and it’s not pretty. Once the bisque cooled I blended the ever loving crap out of it with an immersion hand blender. I love that thing. Of course, it splattered most of my kitchen orange, but it worked like a charm. I probably could have kept things cleaner if I wasn’t also watching Troll Hunter on Netflix, a fantastic import from Norway that I highly recommend. Super entertaining. Yes, there’s subtitles; I don’t want to say what I think about people who won’t watch a movie just because there are subtitles. Troll Hunter is great. Watch it.
Once the bisque was at a smooth, bisque-like consistency, I added about 2/3 cup of heavy cream. Sure, this is optional, but when I say “optional” in reference to heavy cream, I don’t really mean it. I also like to swirl in a little more cream, or even just regular milk on top when I sit down to a bowl ‘o’ bisque, so I didn’t go throwing a full pint of heavy cream in all at once, like I had read on many recipes. I then garnished with a sprig of parsley and a piece of the uber cooked bacon.
It was good, it really was. You can tell from the picture it was a bit on the thick side, and when I reheat the rest I may throw in that extra cup or so of veggie stock I’d mentioned, but other than that my husband loved it and I…liked it…You know what? I’m just not a huge fan of butternut squash. Probably because it’s not a lobster.
The Nerdy Foodie 