As I post these recipes you may notice that I use a lot of butter. If you're concerned about that, follow this link to read more about some of the actual health BENEFITS. Of course everyone knows that butter makes it better. There simply is not a good substitute for the real, rich, creamy, golden goodness of butter.
Hushwe is a traditional Lebanese dish that John grew up eating. I have to be honest...I did not like this dish the first two times I tried it. Now it is one of my all time favorites. The reason it took me a minute to get on-board is that this dish is seasoned with cinnamon. According to my American palette, cinnamon has always and only been associated with apple pie, oatmeal, or deserts...definitely not combined with meat or savory things. Once my mind was able to get past that mental block, I was able to really enjoy it and now I love it.
I used my knowledge of how hushwe is made based on watching family members cook it and also took some tips from Maureen Abood's blog.
Ingredients:
- Split Chicken Breast (many recipes call for roasting a whole chicken but this is just way too much for our family)
- 1 pound ground beef
- 1 cup slivered almonds (pine-nuts are delicious, of course, but much more expensive. You can just use almonds or use a combination of both)
- 1 cup rice (I used basmati but long grain white is what Maureen Abood calls for. I wouldn't reccomend using brown rice - it will not be the right taste or texture.)
- 2 cups chicken stock
- 1 stick of butter
- 1/4 cup lemon juice or 1/2 fresh squeezed lemon
- 1/2 tbls cinnamon
- 1 sweet onion
Salt, pepper, paprika, olive oil
The chicken breast will take longer to cook so prepare it first. I roughly chopped one sweet onion, drizzled olive oil in the bottom of a baking pan, and spread the onion in the baking pan as a bed for the chicken. Put the chicken on the bed of onions and squeeze or drizzle the lemon juice and about 2 tbls olive oil over the chicken, and then sprinkle with salt, pepper, and paprika. I like a lot of paprika. I wanted to bake my chicken "low and slow" so it would be moist. Also, to keep it moist i added about 1/2 cup water to the baking dish and made sure it was covered while baking. I baked it at 300 degrees for close to two hours. I turned up the heat at the end to crisp up the skin a bit. I baked it at 400 for about twenty minutes at the end, uncovered, then took it out and let it rest.
While the chicken was baking I made the hushwe. I started by frying the slivered almonds in butter. With the heat on medium I added about 3 tablespoons butter to the pan, once it was melted I added the slivered almonds. Stay on your toes here! I almost always burn nuts when I am trying to toast them. This is more than toasting, pretty much frying, and you're going a little past the golden stage to a nice brown but not burnt! Once done pour the nuts out of the pan onto a plate and set aside.
Then add your ground beef to the pan and brown it. Season with salt and pepper and the cinnamon. Break it up to a fine texture. Add 3 tablespoons butter and the dry rice to the pan (make sure you're using a pan big enough to accommodate the beef and rice, remembering rice will expand while cooking). Cook the rice in the pan a minute or so letting it soak up some of the butter, then pour in the chicken broth. Bring to boiling them reduce to low and cover. Cook for about 20 mintues until the rice is done and the broth is absorbed.
Add the remaining butter to the finished dish, mixing it thoroughly throughout the beef and rice. Add most of the nuts and stir them in too, but keep a few to sprinkle on top. Shred the chicken off the bone and put on top of the hushwe.
Enjoy this buttery and satisfying meal! It's great for cold weather!
Thursday, February 13, 2014
Friday, January 31, 2014
Reviving the Blog as a Recipe Box
Good Morning! Happy Friday!
I have had this blog since I moved to Asheville "way back" in 2007. Rather than delete it, I changed the blog title and URL to "MahshieMonaLisa Cooks." When I met John he kept referring to me as his "Mona Lisa" and so the name has stuck and become my online handle.
I simply want to share recipes, tips, and tricks I've learned through trial and error in the kitchen. I told a friend I'd write down some of my recipes for her. I might still do that physically, but I thought I might-as-well do it on a blog to keep records for myself and to share with others.
Last night's success story was creamy potato and ham soup. The hard part is, I don't measure a lot and just kind of go by intuition...which works out most of the time. Part of what I want to impart is that ability to just go with it, and not stress about the exactness of everything. Sometimes exact measurements are necessary but the more you cook, the more comfortable you'll become and the more you can improvise. So...as you read these "amounts" pay attention to your own process and adjust accordingly if it doesn't seem right.
Ingredients:
Chicken Stock (maybe 6 cups)
Russet Potatoes (6 med/large)
3 heaping tbls flour
1/2 stick butter
2 tbls olive oil (light, extra virgin is too strong a flavor)
1/2 sweet onion
2 cups diced pre-cooked/sliced ham
4 cups milk (I used 2%)
2 cups sharp cheddar cheese
salt/pepper/onion powder/garlic powder/cayenne pepper to taste
The chicken stock I used was home-made. I used to think that sounded fancy and like way too much work, but really, when I finally made it, it was simple. A while back I roasted a chicken, pulled most of the meat off, and then boiled the remains of the "carcass" (yum what an appetizing word!) in about 10 cups of water for probably 2 hours. I let it cool, strained it, and then put the stock in a freezer bag in the freezer. It is a great way to practice "waste not, want not" and it tastes really good. Although, I do think it smells horrible while boiling. Point is: try it sometime - it's easy-peasy! However, canned/boxed chicken stock will do just fine.
Put the chicken stock in a big stock pot and boil on med/high heat. Dice your potatoes. I like mine in square chunks. You don't want to dice too thin or the potatoes will turn to mush once boiled, but you don't want the pieces so huge they take forever to boil and don't' fit on a soup spoon. So, find a happy medium.
Add diced potatoes to boiling chicken stock and about 1 tsp sea salt.
While potatoes boil, dice 1/2 of a sweet onion and saute in 2 tbls olive oil. Dice ham and add to pan. Saute about 5 - 10 minutes. Scrape onions and ham out of pan into a bowl, or a plate.
Add butter to pan, keep on medium heat. Once it's melted add the flour and whisk. Be careful not to over-brown this butter/flour mixture known as a "roux." It will become bitter if it gets too brown. You're going for a nice golden color. Slowly add milk and whisk continuously. Add some spices. I added some "dashes" of garlic and onion powder, cayenne and black pepper, and salt. Just a few shakes of all those over the milk and whisk it in.You're probably going to end up whisking it for about 5 to ten minutes. Whisk until it starts to thicken like a loose gravy. Once it has thickened, turn off the heat and add your cheese. Continue to whisk until the cheese has melted and blended with the "gravy."
Don't forget all the while the potatoes are happily boiling in the chicken stock. Check from time to time because you don't want them to over boil. They will become mush if they boil too long, you want them to maintain their nice little square shape and structure. Also, you'll want to turn the stock-pot to low and let it cool from the boiling point before you add your "cheese gravy" (sorry I keep saying "cheese-gravy" but I don't know what else to call it because it's not quite a roux and not quite a cheese-sauce). Milk is a delicate protein very sensitive to heat. If you added that cheese-gravy to the chicken stock while still boiling it would curdle.
Before I added the "cheese-gravy" to the potatoes and chicken stock I scooped out some of the stock. I didn't want my soup to be too liquidy but nice and creamy. So - I scooped out enough stock so that the potatoes were just slightly covered with stock. Then I slowly poured in the "cheese gravy" and added the sauted onion and ham. I mixed it all together with a big spoon until well blended.
Then I put in bowls and we ate it. Anna-Joy asked for more which usually means it's a winner, and gives me great joy. Seriously, there's not much that makes me happier then when John and Anna-Joy like the food I make. They can both be a little hard to please at times. John just says "we like good food."
So this recipe made it on the "good food" list. Hope you enjoy!
PS - I'm not sure why certain words are underlined with a link but I don't know how to change that?
I have had this blog since I moved to Asheville "way back" in 2007. Rather than delete it, I changed the blog title and URL to "MahshieMonaLisa Cooks." When I met John he kept referring to me as his "Mona Lisa" and so the name has stuck and become my online handle.
I simply want to share recipes, tips, and tricks I've learned through trial and error in the kitchen. I told a friend I'd write down some of my recipes for her. I might still do that physically, but I thought I might-as-well do it on a blog to keep records for myself and to share with others.
Last night's success story was creamy potato and ham soup. The hard part is, I don't measure a lot and just kind of go by intuition...which works out most of the time. Part of what I want to impart is that ability to just go with it, and not stress about the exactness of everything. Sometimes exact measurements are necessary but the more you cook, the more comfortable you'll become and the more you can improvise. So...as you read these "amounts" pay attention to your own process and adjust accordingly if it doesn't seem right.
Ingredients:
Chicken Stock (maybe 6 cups)
Russet Potatoes (6 med/large)
3 heaping tbls flour
1/2 stick butter
2 tbls olive oil (light, extra virgin is too strong a flavor)
1/2 sweet onion
2 cups diced pre-cooked/sliced ham
4 cups milk (I used 2%)
2 cups sharp cheddar cheese
salt/pepper/onion powder/garlic powder/cayenne pepper to taste
The chicken stock I used was home-made. I used to think that sounded fancy and like way too much work, but really, when I finally made it, it was simple. A while back I roasted a chicken, pulled most of the meat off, and then boiled the remains of the "carcass" (yum what an appetizing word!) in about 10 cups of water for probably 2 hours. I let it cool, strained it, and then put the stock in a freezer bag in the freezer. It is a great way to practice "waste not, want not" and it tastes really good. Although, I do think it smells horrible while boiling. Point is: try it sometime - it's easy-peasy! However, canned/boxed chicken stock will do just fine.
Put the chicken stock in a big stock pot and boil on med/high heat. Dice your potatoes. I like mine in square chunks. You don't want to dice too thin or the potatoes will turn to mush once boiled, but you don't want the pieces so huge they take forever to boil and don't' fit on a soup spoon. So, find a happy medium.
Add diced potatoes to boiling chicken stock and about 1 tsp sea salt.
While potatoes boil, dice 1/2 of a sweet onion and saute in 2 tbls olive oil. Dice ham and add to pan. Saute about 5 - 10 minutes. Scrape onions and ham out of pan into a bowl, or a plate.
Add butter to pan, keep on medium heat. Once it's melted add the flour and whisk. Be careful not to over-brown this butter/flour mixture known as a "roux." It will become bitter if it gets too brown. You're going for a nice golden color. Slowly add milk and whisk continuously. Add some spices. I added some "dashes" of garlic and onion powder, cayenne and black pepper, and salt. Just a few shakes of all those over the milk and whisk it in.You're probably going to end up whisking it for about 5 to ten minutes. Whisk until it starts to thicken like a loose gravy. Once it has thickened, turn off the heat and add your cheese. Continue to whisk until the cheese has melted and blended with the "gravy."
Don't forget all the while the potatoes are happily boiling in the chicken stock. Check from time to time because you don't want them to over boil. They will become mush if they boil too long, you want them to maintain their nice little square shape and structure. Also, you'll want to turn the stock-pot to low and let it cool from the boiling point before you add your "cheese gravy" (sorry I keep saying "cheese-gravy" but I don't know what else to call it because it's not quite a roux and not quite a cheese-sauce). Milk is a delicate protein very sensitive to heat. If you added that cheese-gravy to the chicken stock while still boiling it would curdle.
Before I added the "cheese-gravy" to the potatoes and chicken stock I scooped out some of the stock. I didn't want my soup to be too liquidy but nice and creamy. So - I scooped out enough stock so that the potatoes were just slightly covered with stock. Then I slowly poured in the "cheese gravy" and added the sauted onion and ham. I mixed it all together with a big spoon until well blended.
Then I put in bowls and we ate it. Anna-Joy asked for more which usually means it's a winner, and gives me great joy. Seriously, there's not much that makes me happier then when John and Anna-Joy like the food I make. They can both be a little hard to please at times. John just says "we like good food."
So this recipe made it on the "good food" list. Hope you enjoy!
PS - I'm not sure why certain words are underlined with a link but I don't know how to change that?
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