Brunswick Stew

 I made some Brunswick Stew last month, and decided I needed to share the way I made it.  It's not so much of a recipe, but more of a process.  OK, so you sling a bunch of different stuff into a pot, cook it up and serve it. 

Wait a minute, that's pretty much how this dish evolved.  It consisted of leftovers, random bits of game, veggies and some BBQ sauce, cooked to a nice consistency and then served.  

It has evolved however, the more modern versions of this recipe uses leftover BBQ meat, burnt ends as it were, plus bits and pieces of any leftover BBQ from the night before.  You can read about the origins of the stew here on Wikipedia. 

I do it my way, which results in a pretty tasty dish, even if I do say so myself.  I personally like it served with a piece of my No-Knead bread, but a hunk of cornbread or a biscuit is also lovely.  

Now for why I made this.  I had a half of a smoked chicken, which quite frankly I'm not too fond of, but I knew I also had some pulled pork in the freezer which needed to be eaten soon.

So I took the meat off the bones of the chicken, put it in a pot with the pork, added a 1 lb. or sixteen ounce bag of frozen mixed vegetables to the pot.  Grabbed some of my homemade chicken stock out of the freezer (1 cup if you're into measuring), added that on top, along with a can of diced tomatoes and okra, and about a cup of my favorite BBQ sauce- which is Bullseye, if you're curious.  Let it simmer for bit, then I tasted it, and added 1/2 teaspoon of cayenne for an added bite. 

The best part of this stew is you can, and should make it to your taste.   Use your favorite BBQ sauce, whichever kind of leftover smoked BBQ meat you have, and go for it.  I discovered as I was putting this batch together that the can of diced tomatoes I thought I had in the pantry was gone, but I had a can of diced okra and tomatoes, so it went in.  I had smoked chicken and pork, but you can make this with whatever kinds of smoked meats you have.    Traditionally... you use Corn and Lima beans, but I like mixed veggies so that's what I use.   

In fact I pulled some this out of the freezer the other day for dinner with a friend and we had a chunk of fresh baked bread with it.  And I still have some, just for me.  

Chutney Chicken Salad

 Got some leftover chicken?  

Have I got a recipe for you then.  

That is if you're not doing the 'traditional' Corned Beef today or you just happen to have some leftover chicken, not doing anything, but hanging around.  

Actually this would be good any old time of the year.  But if you are doing the traditional meal today, check out my Corned Beef recipe. I've actually got one going in my crock pot right now.  

Back to the chicken, I had cooked two large chicken breasts the other day, and ate part of one the first day, and the last two days, I ate this chicken salad.  

I may have to cook the other chicken breasts that are hanging out in my freezer, so I can make this again for myself.  I ate it on a bed of butter lettuce and felt rather virtuous. 'wink'.

I have to admit to making this for myself a couple of times now, but I'm ready to share how I made it along with the basic ingredients.  

This is a quick and easy salad to make and serve and is totally delicious.  You can add more or less of all the ingredients to serve 2 or more people.  Chicken loves sweet stuff, so the chutney mixes well with all of it. 

Finish off with a sprinkle of walnuts if you choose.  I think you could also use any kind of nuts as well. I usually have lots of walnuts on hand so, I used them. 

I used full fat mayo, but I bet you could also sub in Greek Yoghurt.  

In other words, make it to your taste.  

 

 

Chutney Chicken Salad

Yield: 2

Author: Sid's Sea Palm Cooking

Prep time: 10 MinTotal time: 10 Min

Leftover chicken meets chutney and makes friends.

Ingredients

• 1-2 cups chopped cooked chicken
• 2 ribs celery chopped
• 1/2 cup dried cranberries
• 1/4 cup chopped walnuts - opt.
• Butter Lettuce - opt.
• 1/4-1/2 cup mayonnaise
• 1/4 -1/2 cup Major Grey Chutney

Instructions

1. Cut the celery and leftover chicken into a dice- roughly the same size. Place the chicken, cranberries and celery into a bowl.
2. Mix the mayo and chutney together and pour over the chicken mixture and toss it together.
3. Mound the chicken salad onto some butter lettuce to serve. This is great with a slice of home made bread or a croissant.

Estimate only

Did you make this recipe?

Tag @sidsseapalmcooking on instagram and hashtag it Sidsseapalmcooking

First Monday Favorites - October 2019 - 35

It's time for First Monday Favorites again.

And I had a grand total of three recipes to choose from.  September was an interesting month, I didn't play a lot in the kitchen, sigh.

But I make a couple of new, to me, recipes, and one fantastic new way to cook chicken.

I made a Spatchcock chicken, and I don't think I'll ever cook a whole chicken any other way.

Not only did it cook quickly, but the chicken breast was moist and tender.

I mean, Hello!!!!  This is the only way to go, if you're going to cook a whole chicken.  Really, you need to try it.

Lets see what everyone else brought to share this month.

Remember, this is the one recipe you made last month, the one you absolutely loved, the one recipe you will make again and again.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Spatchcock Chicken

I know the title, really, it makes it sound rather suspect but if you've ever cooked a chicken like this, I bet you'll continue to do so.

I wasn't actually going to blog about this, but when I told some friends about it, they were intrigued. 
And I realized I'd not taken enough pictures of the process, but I did take some.  Here's a link with lots of pictures, showing how to do it. 

A Spatchcocked Chicken is a whole chicken which has been cooked 'flat' on a roasting pan.
It cooks much faster, the meat stays lovely and moist and it's dead easy to do.
And did I mention that the skin gets lovely and crispy? 
Sometimes that's the best part.   

Basically, you remove the backbone, turn the chicken over, break the breastbone, flatten the chicken out on the pan and roast.

Some instructions I had said to use a kitchen shear to cut the backbone out, and it did kinda work.  I actually have two kinds of shears, but honestly, my hands got kinda greasy from the meat, and they slipped around,  so I ended up using a heavy chef knife to cut through the bones.  

As you can see, once the back bone has been cut out, you can just lift it away.  Save it to use when you make some chicken stock later on.  I just roasted it on the pan with the chicken, and saved it.

Once you've broken the breastbone, flatten it out on a roasting pan.  I brushed the chicken with some melted butter in which I'd put some poultry seasoning.   I then sprinkled it with a little salt, and roasted them for just under 45 minutes at 450 degrees.  You want the internal temp on the breast to reach at least 165 degrees.
BTW, if you also roast the thighs and legs, they need to reach 175 degrees.  But they all seem to cook just fine together. 

 I also cut the very ends of the wings off, and let them roast on the pan as well.  They ended up in a pot along with the backbone for stock. 

And this is the result, a gorgeous browned chicken breast, which I sliced up and served with a gravy I'd made from the fond ( the lovely brown stuff from the roasting pan, so good). 

I elected to cut the thigh and drumsticks off,  and roast them separately because I had plans for them.  Delicious plans.

I roasted them in a separate pan for 15 minutes, then took them out of the oven, brushed them with some delicious sweet chile sauce mixed with some berry preserves, (the sweet hot chile sauce was given to me by a friend and is so good all by itself).  I let them roast for another 15 minutes, and then basted them again, after another 15 minutes.  They were falling off the bone tender, and I have just enough of the sweet hot chile sauce to do another batch of chicken but this time, I'm doing wings.

There was just enough chicken left for two lunches.  I took the meat off of the bones and feasted.

So there you have it.  A truly moist, delicious roast chicken ready in under an hour.
Hello,  really, under an hour.  This particular chicken was about 6 pounds, and if I'd roasted it whole in the oven, it would have taken a lot longer to cook.
I didn't cook it on a rack, but just on the pan itself and it worked out very well.  

Chicken Cheezy Soup for #SoupSaturdaySwappers

The theme this month, should you choose to accept it, for Soup Saturday Swappers that is, is a soup using Cheese. We're celebrating Dairy Month and Ashley of Cheese Curd in Paradise is our hostess.
I was conflicted, torn, beside myself.

It's hot outside so I needed something that could be made fast, and of course it had to taste good as well.

I wavered between my beloved Mexican style soups, and the dim, faint memory I had of a used to be famous beer cheese soup from the now defunct Baby Doe's Matchless Mine in Dallas. Which apparently was based on Cheese Whiz.

And then my attention went to a soup my niece made for us about ten years ago, which was basically a potato cheese soup.

I tell you my mind was confused looking at all my options, so I went sorta mexican, sorta beer cheese soup and kinda potato cheese.

Confused?
Not when you taste this you won't.  I'm just calling it Chicken Cheezy Soup.
It's also a sippable soup.  I know, but having a soup I can sip while working at my computer, is a good thing.

I think this one hits most of the right notes as well. 

To start with, I used some of my home made stock.  You can use packaged stock as well. I did amp up the flavor using some Herb Ox chicken seasoning as well. It's salt free, but adds a nice note.

   And there is plenty of salt in the cheese sauce. Yes, I said cheese sauce, I used some Velveeta Cheese sauce in here. I don't use a lot of prepackaged stuff, but DH likes his mashed taters with the addition of instant garlic potato flakes and you can't beat the meltability (is that a word?) of Velveeta.  I chose to use the cheese sauce in this recipe.

Cheezy Chicken Soup

Yield: 4 servings

Author: Sid's Sea Palm Cooking

prep time: 10 Mcook time: 15 Mtotal time: 25 M

Full of cheese flavor, it's perfect with a slice of home made bread.

ingredients:

Cheezy Chicken Soup

• 4 cups Chicken Broth
• 1 packet Herb Ox chicken base (no salt)
• 2- 4 oz. Pouches Velveeta Cheese Sauce
• 1 cup beer- I used Corona
• ½ cup instant garlic potato flakes
• 2 cloves roasted garlic- minced
• Chives for garnish
• Sliced Radish for garnish if desired
• Leftover cooked chicken, minced if desired.

instructions:

How to cook Cheezy Chicken Soup

1. Simmer the soup stock, roasted garlic and beer together for 5 minutes. Whisk in the instant potato flakes and let cook for 2-3 minutes. Add the cheese sauce and heat through. Serve with some chopped chives on top and some leftover chicken. This also goes well with toasted sourdough buns.

Created using The Recipes Generator

• Ashley, Cheese Curd In Paradise: Pepper Jack Potato and Bacon Soup
• Karen, Karen's Kitchen Stories: Sopa de Queso - Cheese Soup with Chiles and Potato
• Cindy, Cindy's Recipes and Writings: Cheesy Broccoli Pesto Noodle Soup
• Wendy, A Day in the Life on the Farm: Caramelized Onion and Gruyere Soup
• Camilla , Culinary Adventures with Camilla: Chilled Watermelon and Rosé Soup
• Juli, Pandemonium Noshery: German Cheese and Leek Soup
• Sneha, Sneha's Recipe: Vegetable Garlicky Cottage Cheese Soup
• Sid , Sid's Sea Palm Cooking: Chicken Cheezy Soup
• Barrie, Hardly A Goddess: Weeknight Cheeseburger Soup with RealCheese!