Summer Chicken Salad

Summer meals are hard for me. I can always think of lots of warm, comfort food type dishes, but in the summer heat I'm at a loss for what to prepare. With all the delicious produce in season, you would think it would be easy. Just goes to show my food creativity is totally lacking.

A few weeks ago as I was preparing our meal plan I sought inspiration from the cooking blog goddess, Pioneer Woman, and she delivered! We've had this meal several times now (just had it tonight!) and it always proves to be refreshing and delicious!

Tandoori Chicken and Curried Couscous Salad

Ok I want to do a quick food blog post before we put up pictures of the baby and tell the birth story and all that jazz. I guess this post would be the first chapter in the birth story as this dinner was only a few hours before Holli went into labor. I came to the realization that my culinary adventures might be slowed down a bit with a baby in the house. I decided to throw one last nice dinner and we invited our friends the Soffes. I don’t cook a lot of Indian food and I thought it would be fun to shake things up. We had a wonderful dinner and a lot of fun with the Soffes. They have a son Mack who is almost one so they couldn’t stay too late and they went home at about 7pm. We cleaned up the kitchen, watched some TV and went to bed. The Indian food wasn't spicy, but it must have done some sort of magic because Holli went in to labor 5 hours later.

Everything was really easy to make, but it just took a little time. The chicken marinates overnight and you just stick it in the oven. The couscous just required chopping some stuff up and making up a dressing and roasting some cauliflower. The Naan and Hummus were store bought (I’m not that hardcore). I did cut the curry powder down in the couscous so it’s a little milder.

Tandoori-Marinated Chicken with Cucumber, Lime, and Chiles

Active Time: 20 minutes

Total time: Up to overnight

Serves 4 to 6

1½ teaspoons whole cumin seeds

1 teaspoon whole coriander seeds

½ teaspoon whole fennel seeds

1 onion, coarsely chopped

2 large garlic cloves, minced

2 tablespoons minced ginger

3 tablespoons vegetable oil

½ teaspoon ground turmeric

½ cup Greek yogurt

Coarse salt

1 whole chicken (about 4½ pounds)

Cucumbers, lime wedges, and chiles (such as Serrano)

1. Toast cumin, coriander, and fennel seeds in a skillet over medium heat until fragrant, about 2 minutes. Grind into a fine powder.

2. Purée onion, garlic, and ginger. Heat oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion mixture. Fry until translucent, about 5 minutes. Stir in spice mixture and turmeric. Let cool.

3. Stir yogurt into onion mixture. Season with salt.

4. Place chicken, breast side up, on a rimmed baking sheet, and tuck wings under. Tie legs together with kitchen twine. Pat chicken dry with paper towels. Gently separate skin from breast of chicken, and rub some of the yogurt mixture under the skin on each side. Cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least 8 hours or overnight.

5. Preheat oven to 450°. Uncover chicken, and season with salt. Reduce oven temperature to 400°. Add chiles and limes to pan. Roast chicken for 30 minutes.

Remove from oven, and tent loosely with foil. Return to oven, rotating sheet. Roast until juices run clear and an instantread thermometer inserted into the thickest part of a thigh reaches 165°, about 30 minutes more. Let rest for 10 minutes before serving with cucumbers, lime wedges, and chiles.

Curried Couscous Salad

Ingredients

Cauliflower:

• Vegetable oil cooking spray

• 1 medium head cauliflower, trimmed and cut into 1/2 to 1-inch pieces

• 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

• Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Salad:

• 2 cups low-sodium chicken broth

• 1 1/2 tablespoons mild curry powder (I used ½ tablespoon)

• 1/2 teaspoon salt

• 1 (10-ounce box) couscous

• 3/4 cup dried cranberries

• 1/2 cup coarsely chopped, roasted and lightly salted cashews

• 1 (4-inch) piece cucumber, peeled, seeded and chopped into 1/2-inch pieces

• 1/3 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

• 1 large lemon, zested

Dressing:

• 1/3 cup Greek yogurt

• 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

• 1 1/2 teaspoons mild curry powder (again I used ½ teaspoon)

• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

• Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Directions

Cauliflower: Put an oven rack in the center of the oven. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Spray a baking sheet liberally with vegetable oil cooking spray. Set aside. In a medium bowl, toss the cauliflower and olive oil together until coated. Put in a single layer on the prepared baking sheet and season with salt and pepper, to taste. Roast until golden and tender, about 25 to 30 minutes. Set aside to cool for 10 minutes.

Salad: In a medium saucepan, bring the chicken broth, curry powder and salt to a boil over medium-high heat. Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the couscous. Cover the pot and allow the couscous to absorb the liquid, about 5 to 7 minutes. Fluff the couscous with a fork and transfer it to a large serving bowl. Stir in the cooked cauliflower, cranberries, cashews, cucumber, parsley, and lemonzest. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

Dressing: In a small bowl, whisk together the yogurt, olive oil and curry powder until smooth. Whisk in the lemon juice and season with salt and pepper, to taste.

Just before serving, add the dressing to the salad and toss well to coat.

Lost

Well Lost is over, but we took it out with a bang! For the past few months we have been having Lost dinner nights with our friends Stephanie and Michael. We would switch off making a fancy dinner or a fancy desert. This week we combined forces and made a five course dinner. We started off with a salad with bacon vinaigrette and a poached egg next was carrot apple bisque, then a balsamic cherry tomato bruchetta. The main course was homemade cheese ravioli with a roasted garlic and tomato cream sauce. Desert was the crème brulee recipe that I posted last week. Let's just say it was delicious and I shed a tear for every course. I was even more satisfied after watching the LOST series finale. Ok here are a couple of recipes.

Frisée Salad with Bacon-Shallot Vinaigrette

Ingredients

3 slice(s) bacon, cut into 1/2-inch pieces

12 ounce(s) (2 to 3 heads) frisée or 2 bags (5 to 6 oz. each) mixed baby salad greens

1 medium shallot, minced

2 tablespoon(s) white wine vinegar

1 teaspoon(s) Dijon mustard

1/4 teaspoon(s) salt

1/4 teaspoon(s) pepper

2 tablespoon(s) olive oil

6 large eggs

Directions

In 2-quart saucepan, cook bacon on medium 5 minutes or until browned, stirring occasionally.

Meanwhile, in 12-inch skillet, heat 1 inch water to boiling on high to poach eggs in later. Trim and discard stem ends from frisée; cut leaves into bite-size pieces. Place greens in large bowl.

Remove saucepan from heat. With slotted spoon, transfer bacon to paper towels to drain; discard all but 1 tablespoon bacon fat.

Into bacon fat remaining in skillet, whisk shallot, vinegar, Dijon, 1/4 teaspoon salt, and 1/4 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper. In slow, steady stream, whisk in oil until combined. Add warm vinaigrette to bowl with frisée and toss until evenly coated.

Reduce skillet heat to medium to maintain water at gentle simmer. Break eggs, one at a time, into cup. Holding cup close to surface of water, slip in each egg. Cook eggs 3 to 5 minutes or until whites are set and yolks begin to thicken. With slotted spoon, lift out each egg and quickly drain, still in spoon, on paper towels.

To serve, divide frisée among 6 salad plates; top with bacon and egg. Sprinkle egg with coarsely ground black pepper if you like.

Carrot Apple Bisque

4 Carrots, peeled and cut into chunks

1 Tbsp. butter

4-8 C. chicken broth

1 large apple, chopped, or 1 C. apple sauce

1/2 C. heavy whipping cream

1/2 tsp. nutmeg

1/3 C. green onion or chives, minced

In a sauce pan, combine carrots with butter and 1 C. of the chicken broth. Cook, covered, until carrots are very tender, about 15 minutes. Add apple and cook 5 more minutes. Remove pan from heat, take off lid and allow cooling for about 10 minutes. Whirl carrot mixture into a blender until smooth or force mixture through a strainer. You may need to add more chicken broth to blend. Return to saucepan. Stir in the cream and nutmeg. Stir in remaining chicken broth until the soup reaches the desired texture. I like mine a little more liquidy. Serve hot or cold. Top with chopped chives or green onions.