Take Two

Oh, the frustration!!  I finally got around to writing about the dinner I made from the cookbook this week only to have my computer crash and lose it all!  And no, I can’t recover the document; it kept sending up messages saying it couldn’t auto save, etc.  I had opened my original post talking about how I loved cooking and eating but didn’t enjoy writing so much.  Oh, the irony!  So here I am, writing this post again.  (Should I also mention I have about 3 other posts to write?  Why write when you can read or knit?)

Since I’m so far behind, I will work backwards and start with this week’s menu.

Menu

Chicken Cordon Bleu (p. 150)

Ruth’s Chris Potatoes (p. 80)

Pumpkin Bars (p. 291)

(I have just saved what I’ve written so far. . .) I started with the chicken.  Since some of our eating habits have changed, our family has a hard time eating an entire chicken breast; so I used chicken tenders.  The conventional chicken breasts seem to be getting bigger and thicker—have you looked at a chicken recently?  There is no way that what is in some of those packages is natural.  And when I discovered that the companies don’t have to disclose on the package if they add water or sodium fillers, I started changing the way I buy chicken.  Right now, I like Trader Joe’s choices.  (I would love to get a chicken directly from a farm; but until that happens, I will be content with what I can find.)  So, I lined the bottom of the casserole dish with chicken tenders and then followed the recipe exactly as is in the book.  (Press save here.)

I have made traditional chicken cordon bleu before.  It is one of my favorite ways to eat chicken, but I do not enjoy preparing it.  I don’t enjoy pounding the poultry, spreading the layers, rolling the poultry, putting in toothpicks, and dredging it in egg and then bread crumbs.  And when you are trying to keep peace and order in that post-nap/pre-dinner part of the day, who has time to do all that anyway?  But I was committed to making this recipe and doing that if I had to.  You can imagine my extreme delight when I discovered that all this recipe called for was layering everything on top of the chicken!  So simple!  And the flavor was just as savory as I remembered.  The texture was slightly different; a little more like a casserole than the traditional cordon bleu, but for a family meal, who cares?  Certainly not I, and neither did my husband or my son.  I think they may have enjoyed it even more.  This dish would work quite well for company or to take to a pot-luck.  (Press save here.)

Next I made the potatoes.  I chose this recipe because I didn’t want to peel potatoes, and the recipe didn’t say one had to do that.  The trickiest thing about making this recipe was scrubbing the potatoes and then slicing them.  You do have to “babysit” these potatoes a little bit in order to uncover them partway into the baking process and then add the cheese.  But in my opinion, that’s fairly easy to do.  And who can go wrong with potatoes, garlic, and cheese? 

The pumpkin bars were a little more involved and not just because I had a little help in the making of them.  I put the mix into an 11x7 pan just as the recipe said, only to discover that it made the bars really thick.  I went ahead and baked it that way though, as I am trying to follow the recipes.  Since the mixture was so thick, I ended up baking it for 45-50 minutes rather than the 25-30 the recipe suggested, and the middle was still slightly gooey.  If you make this recipe, I would recommend putting it in either a 9x13 pan or even splitting the mix between two smaller pans.  The smell of the pumpkin and the spices baking was wonderful, and the taste was everything a fall recipe should be—but really, any excuse to eat cream cheese icing will work for me!

(And save.)